


Walk a Mile on this Crutch

by AParticularlyLargeBear



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: 5+1 Things, Disability, F/F, Fluff, Friendship, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-01
Updated: 2015-05-07
Packaged: 2018-03-20 16:32:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 30,636
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3657357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AParticularlyLargeBear/pseuds/AParticularlyLargeBear
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Or, 'five times having only one leg was an issue, and once that it wasn't.'</p>
<p>A dip into the life of Rosemary Surana and her adventures in the Blight, and the struggles she encountered along the way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The First Occasion: Kinloch Hold

**Author's Note:**

> Now with a bonus art!
> 
> By: http://toodletots.tumblr.com/

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a quick note; there's some ableistic language throughout the fic. It pretty much entirely comes from unpleasant people being awful, but I feel regardless that it's worth giving a heads-up if that's likely to bother you.

The Circle tower was difficult to navigate. It was _big_ , much bigger than any building in Denerim’s Alienage, which meant that it may as well have been a castle to the perspective of a little elf girl who’d barely seen her eighth summer. While the children weren’t supposed to go anywhere without supervision, Rosemary constantly found herself getting distracted with wide-eyed wonder by her surroundings and lagging behind. More than once, an irritated sister had to stop to retrieve her, chiding the child and saying that she had to pay more attention. Even so, if she had to be away from home – and Rosemary missed her parents desperately – at least it was somewhere interesting.

The other reason the tower gave Rosemary trouble was fairly simple: stairs. Lots and lots of stairs. Lessons, quarters, meals, they were all on different floors, and it was a rare day that Rosemary wasn’t climbing and descending at various points throughtout.

They’d be enough of an issue on their own; a lot of the younger children also had difficulties marching up and down, tiring work for small bodies. However, for her specifically, there was one problem in particular.

Rosemary scowled with all the malice an eight year old could muster, brow furrowing, face scrunching up. The robes had been fun at first; much nicer than anything she’d worn at the Alienage, a little bit like being able to play dress-up, imagine that she was one of the well-to-do ladies that her mother scrubbed floors for. However, the novelty had quickly worn off once Rosemary realised that – _ugh_ , she’d just stepped on the hem again– it was impossible not to get constantly tangled up in them, stumbling and tripping each time she put a foot wrong. Stairs were the worst of all, because she had to take them one at a time and if she overbalanced and fell, the hard and unforgiving angles of the staircases meant it really hurt. She already had bruises all the way down her forearms because of that.

Clumsily, Rosemary poked at the snagged hem with the crutch in her right hand, shuffling her foot to free it up. The crutch was an ugly, inelegant thing, fashioned from what appeared to have originally been a tree branch, certainly no master class in carpentry, and equally something that the young elf was absolutely never without.

A little growl of frustration in the back of her throat, and Rosemary finally managed to get the trapped robe loose. Shuffling to the side slightly, Rosemary put her crutch up onto the next step and hopped forward. Hop, hop, hop. Once she got a rhythm going it wasn’t so bad, really; the clothes were just really inconvenient and ill-suited and she just kind of wished that she had something easier to wear.

It made her a little bit sad, because the robes were pretty. However, it was impossible to adapt them to accommodate the reason that Rosemary had a crutch in the first place; her right leg was missing, ending at a knot of flesh just a short distance below the waist. The other children and even some of the teachers asked about it a lot, wondering if she’d been run over by a cart or had to have it cut off; one girl a little older than her had even asked, wide-eyed, if it had been eaten by a wolf. The truth was both more and less simple, and it was that she’d never had the limb in the first place. Her memory didn’t stretch particularly far, but for as long as Rosemary could remember, she’d only had the one leg, had to make her way around in a lopsided, hopping gait, using her crutch as a balance. According to her parents, she’d been born tiny, which was annoying because that meant she’d always been small, too. She didn’t _like_ being so small. In any case, back home she’d had several pairs of pants with the right leg sewn into a parcel-like fold so that it didn’t get in the way. Rosemary’s robes had no such modifications, and it was a cause of a good deal of annoyance for a young girl who really just wanted to get around, thanks.

The rest of the group had already reached the top of the stairs by the time Rosemary made it two thirds of the way up. The sister leading the way waited with ill-concealed impatience for Rosemary to catch up to the others, and all she could do by way of apology was smile politely and say sorry. Even at her young age, Rosemary was used to people growing exasperated with her; she was clumsy, awkward, spoke far too quickly and had a knack for getting in the way. She didn’t _mean_ to get in the way, she just thought about things a lot, got distracted by them, and that meant that she wasn’t always looking where she was going.

Besides, she was loud – her crutch was always click-clacking on the floor as she hopped about, so really, it was their fault for not hearing her coming.

Rosemary hummed to herself as she clattered along at the rear of the group. She wondered when her parents were going to be able to visit. The tower was a long way from Denerim, but they hadn’t forgotten about her, surely.

They’d send a letter, or something.

 

* * *

 

In retrospect, the copy of _Spirits: A Study of the Fade_ was probably one book too many for the stack Rosemary had tucked underneath her arm. However, that was scant consolation as Rosemary felt the books starting to slip from her grasp, and it was let them go or let her crutch go, which limited her options. Stupid past!Rosemary, telling her that the study area was only one floor down from the main library, it would be fine to take the extra book so she didn’t have to worry about a second trip later. Damn her.

Rosemary made a game effort to arrest the slide, attempting to hitch the books upwards and get them back under control. Unfortunately, her attention being on this meant that she failed to notice the slightly raised lip of the doorway ahead. The end of her crutch caught onto the hearth, and most ungracefully, she slipped over with a crash and the thump of tomes slapping on stone, taking most of the fall awkwardly on one arm.

She let out a torrent of curses as her elbow rang with pain. No matter how many times she fell over, she never got completely used to it. While she’d had fourteen years to learn and adapt to her disability, sometimes it just so happened to get the drop on her. You win this round, absentee limb.

“My, my. It’s been quite some time since I’ve heard such language from someone so young.”

Rosemary blushed to the tips of her pointed ears as she looked up into the wizened, yet friendly face of First Enchanter Irving, a twinkle in his eye.

“F-first enchanter,” she stammered. “I didn’t mean- I just fell, was all.”

Irving leaned down and retrieved one of the books, glancing at the cover. “Your instructors tell me you are showing great aptitude for the school of spirit. I will admit to some scepticism, considering your own ah… exuberance. I felt certain you’d be an elementalist.”

Rosemary flushed harder, and Irving gave a dry chuckle.

“Oh come now, your face is so bright I could use you as a lantern. I merely tease you, child,” Irving offered her his hand, and with a little effort, Rosemary was back up on her feet, awkwardness of pulling her up offset by how small and light she was. The years hadn’t added much to either her height or her weight, and Rosemary was steadily becoming resigned to the fact that even the younger apprentices were going to wind up outgrowing her.

Gingerly, Rosemary brushed herself down, stooping in a practiced motion to pick up her crutch. A newer one, now, better crafted, made by one of the tranquil in the tower as even she had got too big for the original eventually. She adored it. The support safely back in place, Rosemary hurriedly reassembled her pile of books, taking care to cradle them closer to her chest this time.

“Spirits are interesting, First Enchanter,” Rosemary said quietly.

Irving smiled indulgently. “Indeed they are, though such curiosities must as always be tempered with caution. But I have taken up too much of your time,” he handed Rosemary the book back. “Do be careful. I fear for the sensibilities of your fellow apprentices, should you respond to a fall with such curses again.”

Rosemary smiled. “Sure thing, First Enchanter.”

“I particularly enjoyed the one about the staff and the Libertarian. I shall have to remember it for later.”

Rosemary bit back a laugh and stepped past Irving to continue manoeuvring along the corridor. Carrying so many books just set her entire rhythm off; under ideal circumstances, she could bounce around the place with the agility of a cat, if not the dexterity of one. It drove the templars to distraction, especially the newer ones who expected her to move slowly. The senior sisters had finally capitulated to her repeated insistence that she be allowed to have her own clothes – breeches especially, and she was much happier to not have to worry about tripping over her robes constantly.

Still, her initial spill instilled in her a sense of caution, and it was for this reason that she didn’t go crashing headlong into the person hovering around the side of a blind corner. Stopping short with a jolt, Rosemary just about managed to retain hold of her books. A blonde boy, probably not that much older than her, a little gawky and a lot lost.

“Sorry, didn’t see you there,” she was all set to move on, then did a little double take as she noticed the blazing sword emblem sewn onto the shirt . Templar initiates weren’t an uncommon sight, per se, but they tended to keep to their own areas of the tower unless they were receiving hands-on demonstrations. It sort of undermined the whole ‘mages are our charges’ side of the deal for them to wander around alone.

“Oh uh, it’s fine, really,” his voice hadn’t quite broken yet, betrayed by a slight squeakiness. He shuffled awkwardly, and Rosemary studied him for a second.

“Are you waiting for someone?” she asked, after a little deliberation.

“No, well, sort of,” he rubbed awkwardly at his hair, a tousled mop of curls. “I’m supposed to be delivering a message to senior enchanter Sweeney, only I, um… can’t find him.”

Rosemary broke into a smile. That wasn’t much of a surprise; enchanter Sweeney was of that age where he more or less did exactly as he wanted with little regard for anyone else. This, admittedly, mostly took the form of quietly reading in secluded parts of the tower, but it made it difficult for those not familiar with his habits to track him down.

“I’m on my way to one of his usual haunts. I could take it for you, if you like.”

The initiate’s eyes went wide. “Oh – I ah, well that’s nice of you, but I couldn’t. The Knight Commander asked me personally.”

Rosemary shifted her grip on her books a little. Ooh, official business, now her curiosity was piqued. “Do you want me to show you there, at least?”

He hesitated, seeming to struggle between pride and the need to get this task done, and then he nodded.

“All right,” Rosemary beamed. “My name’s Rosemary. I’d shake your hand but, y’know, full,” she raised both arms slightly.

“I’m Cullen,” he appeared to notice her crutch for the first time. “Oh, is your leg bro…ken?” he tailed off, and his face froze over in the type of abjectly embarrassed horror only possible for those who had well and truly lodged their foot in their mouth.

“Nope, just on holiday,” Rosemary replied with a wink. “It’s been working really hard, so I gave it some time off,” she was used to the full gamut of reactions to her disability, from sympathy to scorn. Awkward? She could deal with awkward.

Cullen laughed; an abrupt burst that ended almost as soon as it had begun, shooting her a guilty look, as if he wasn’t sure whether it was okay to find that funny.

“Come on, it’s this way,” Rosemary indicated with her head, her long black braid flipping over her shoulder for a moment, then set off again. After a moment, Cullen followed.

“Can I help you with those books?” he called from behind her as they headed down the hallway. “They look heavy.”

“Don’t worry about it, I have them,” a quick glance over the shoulder. “Are you new? I haven’t seen you around before. Not that I’m on a first name basis with many of you guys, but I’m good with faces.”

“I’ve been in training for two years,” Cullen managed to draw up alongside her, looking a little taken aback by Rosemary’s pace. “But I was only assigned to Kinloch Hold a few months ago. It’s… quiet here. I like the lake.”

“It beats Denerim, for sure.”

“You’re from the capital? I’ve never been there.”

"Born and raised,” Rosemary replied cheerfully. “Well, ‘till I stopped a runaway cart with a magical barrier, anyway. Your lot came and snapped me up pretty quick after that. Most exciting thing that ever happened to me,” her face clouded over for just an instant, and then it was gone. Though the Circle was a home to her now, she still had moments where she missed her parents. She wondered how they were doing, whether they’d had any other children. Communications with the outside world were severely limited for mages, especially apprentices like her.

“You used magic? Without training?” his expression was a little incredulous. “How old were you?”

“Bout seven. Maybe eight. Just remember thinking ‘Oh Maker, that cart’s gonna knock someone over!’ and the next thing I knew, whoooosh!” Rosemary made an exaggerated noise with her mouth. She rolled her shoulder, shrugging as best she could with both hands full. “Most kids seem to set stuff on fire, when they find out they’re mages.”

“Are you happy or disappointed that you didn’t?” asked Cullen, with just a hint of teasing in his voice.

“Maker, happy, definitely. Fires are scary. They can stay in the hearths where they belong,” Rosemary had never been very interested in her lessons concerning the elemental school, in some part not comfortable with it. Most elemental magic had limited utility beyond harming others, and that just didn’t sit right with her. Wasn’t the entire point of the Circle that they could learn to use their magic safely, without being a threat?

Eh. That was over her head anyway. She’d have time for debating that kind of thing when she was a little older, went through that Harrowing thing that people kept bringing up. Rosemary didn’t know exactly what _that_ would involve. Some kind of test, definitely, but the details were always sketchy, changed from apprentice to apprentice. Jowan was always speculating about it.

“I don’t know how you move this fast on one foot,” Cullen said, bringing her out of her thoughts.

“Practice,” Rosemary replied flippantly. “It’s just natural to me, I suppose. Like you don’t think about walking, right? This is how I walk. Just need a slight bit of help, is all.”

“Hm,” Cullen considered, and then nodded. “Didn’t really think of it like that.”

“Most people don’t,” her tone, for just a moment, was bitter. She hated being treated like she was somehow less for her disability, especially when others seemed to expect, for whatever reason, that it went hand in hand with her either being dull or needing her hand held. Maybe her diminutive stature contributed by making her look younger than she really was, but it was irritating at best and upsetting at worst. Rosemary wasn’t worse than anyone else. Well… not purely because of her missing leg, anyway.

Rosemary planted her foot and came to a halt outside an open room. Within were a plethora of desks and bookcases.

“Okay this is me. If he’s not in here, just check the other studies on the floor; he’ll either be in one of those or else… I don’t know, maybe the stockroom. He likes to ‘rest his eyes’ in there.”

“Thanks for the help, Rosemary. I thought I was going to be looking for the enchanter all day.”

“Any time,” Rosemary paused, considered. “Well, not _any_ time. Not after curfew, or at lunch; you’re not more important than food just yet. But any other time.”

Cullen grinned. “I’ll keep that in mind. Maybe I’ll bribe you with a pie next time.”

“You know, you templars aren’t all bad, for evil jailors and all.”

He snuffed a laugh and headed into the study. Rosemary watched him go with a little smile, and then moved on herself, scanning for Jowan. Hopefully he wouldn’t mind that she was a little late for their study session…

 

* * *

 

“Fuck!” Rosemary swore, then paused. No, that didn’t seem to quite reflect the situation. “Maker on a cow’s flaming arse!” she added.

Better.

“I swear, you find new ways to blaspheme every day.”

Rosemary started, looking up from the stone bench she was sitting on to see Cullen standing over her, wearing full armour. That she hadn’t heard him moving along in the plate was testament to how rattled she was, although she still wasn’t quite used to the sight of her friend decked out like all the rest of them. Had it really been a month already since he took on full duties?

Still, she managed a smile. She’d been worried that Cullen officially becoming a templar would mean that they wouldn’t be able to see each other as often, and circumstances had frequently transpired to prevent them from exchanging more than a few words for days at a time. However, they’d found excuses where they could, and it wasn’t as if this would be the first time a mage and a templar had struck up a friendship.

“I’ll stop blaspheming when He stops having a horrible sense of humour,” Rosemary answered, unable to keep the smile on her face.

Cullen tipped his head with concern. “What’s the matter?”

Rosemary sighed and held up the object that she’d had lying across her lap; her crutch. The bottom half of it had been snapped off, leaving it a jagged point and entirely useless.

His eyes widened. “How did that happen?”

Rosemary gritted her teeth. “Another ‘prank’ by one of your bestest friends. I got shoved in the back while I was going down the stairs. It was break the crutch or break a bone.”

Cullen looked wounded. “Most of us aren’t like that, Rose.”

She immediately regretted saying it, seeing the reproach in his eyes. “I know, I’m sorry, that wasn’t fair. Just having a hard time right now. I’m supposed to be Harrowed soon, and everyone keeps telling ghost stories. I really didn’t need those Mabari-licking blockheads messing with me too.”

“Has anyone told you that you have an incredible filthy mouth?”

“I _like_ my crutch,” Rosemary replied plaintively. “I’m allowed to call people names for making me break it.”

“You didn’t answer the question,” Cullen teased.

Ugh, now he was being cute with her. “Yes. All the fucking time,” she emphasised the profanity deliberately.

Cullen laughed, and then shook his head, sobering abruptly. “I really am sorry, Rose. You should report them to the Knight-Commander.”

Rosemary scoffed. “Greagoir won’t care, Cullen. If it’s not staring him straight in the face, he isn’t going to lift a finger to help. He doesn’t like me, remember?”

Cullen’s jaw tightened. “The Knight-Commander is a good and honourable man, committed to his duties, Rose. He knows we’re here to protect you.”

Rosemary held up a hand. “I’m not saying he isn’t. But he still doesn’t like me.”

“You did get into a raging argument with a sister in front of him.”

“Look, if she’s going to lecture me about the Chant, she better be getting her verses right.”

“There’s a difference between correcting someone and telling them that they’re talking out of their, um, well, bottom,” Cullen flushed slightly.

Rosemary giggled, in spite of herself. “That was a good one, though,” she sighed. “Point is, they’ll just spin it as an accident, and then get me back worse for trying to land them in trouble. It’s not worth the effort. There’s a lot more that they can do to me than I can do to them,” a slight weariness. It was nice to have a templar friend, have a face put on those blank, intimidating helms, but equally, it was impossible not to be reminded of whose hands held the keys and whose were bound with manacles. Get on a mage’s bad side, and the worst that could happen without the fury of the Maker descending upon the practitioner was getting transferred to another post. Fall foul of the wrong templar, and they could easily make a mage’s life a living hell.

Cullen looked conflicted. “I should be getting back to my duties,” he paused. “Can I borrow your crutch? I’ll give it back later.”

She hesitated, and then shrugged, handing it over. “Only because it’s broken though,” she warned him. “Trust me, getting around without it gets old really, really fast,” she gave a groan. “I’m going to have to ask for a new one, and they’ll make me fill out every requisition order known to man, and _then_ it’ll take weeks for them to actually get one for me. Maker’s balls. This is going to suck.”

“Maybe if you stopped taking His name in vain, these things would stop happening.”

“Har de har,” Rosemary answered sourly. “Didn’t you have duties? Or are your duties being a smartarse?”

Cullen grinned and stepped away. “All right, all right. We’ll talk more soon. If this happens again, please tell…” he paused. “Tell someone, anyway. It’s not fair to you.”

Rosemary nodded, smiled wryly.

That night, when Rose returned to the apprentices’ dormitory, her crutch was laying on her bed, repaired and looking almost as good as new. Her heart about melted.

 

* * *

 

Rosemary didn’t, however, see Cullen for almost another month.

At first, she didn’t think much of it; one could easily go a while without seeing a particular templar, depending on which duties they’d been assigned to. As Cullen’s absence began to stretch from days to a week, though, Rosemary began to feel pricklings of concern.

It wasn’t like him not to at least stop by for a quick chat, and after what he’d done for her, she’d been wanting to thank him. Indeed, Rose had assumed that he’d be looking to meet up as soon as possible so he could brag a little about it. He tended to get proud of anything he accomplished, and truthfully, Rosemary was both rather impressed and quite curious. Just how had Cullen managed to get the crutch fixed? It would have taken her ages to have it replaced, and been extremely inconvenient in the meantime. She could hop around without the support, of course, but it was not only more tiring, it was more likely to result in her tripping and falling, too.

Setting aside her gratitude for a second, she just missed him. Rosemary didn’t have a lot of people who would put up with her motormouthed chattering, and even some of those that would tolerate it tended to view it as overcompensating. Not her fault she thought better when she spoke out loud. Sure, she had a number of _friends_ , but only so many that could carry a conversation with her for more than a short while without becoming overwhelmed.

The templars were tight-lipped when Rosemary went digging for information, one of the knight-captains informing her in no uncertain terms that it wasn’t any of her business where various knights were or weren’t posted. She was forced to give up that line of inquiry, and she found herself uneasy. Just where was Cullen?

It was midway through the fourth week that she caught a glimpse of those unmistakable blonde curls across the library, and it was all Rosemary could do not to leap up from her desk and go galloping towards him. Had to at least be subtle about things. Subtle-ish.

Calmly, Rosemary rose, shifted her crutch into place, and began making her way past the towering bookshelves to where Cullen stood watch, apparently on duty at the stairwell. His eyes widened as he spotted her, and a flicker of something that may have been worry passed over his face.

“Hey there stranger. Thought you’d been whisked off into the Fade,” Rosemary said casually as she hopped up, trying not to let show how relieved she was to see him again.

“I was… indisposed,” he hesitated for a long time before settling on the word, and Rose immediately knew that something was wrong.

“Never thought I’d see Cullen Rutherford skip an opportunity for praise. Seriously, having this,” she lifted the crutch for emphasis. “Has been a gift from the Maker. Thought it would be weeks before I could walk properly again.”

“I’m glad,” Cullen made a wry face. “I uh… I got in a lot of trouble for fixing it, actually.”

Rosemary blinked. “Wait, you’re serious?”

Cullen grimaced. “The Knight-Commander disapproves of our uh-“ he hitched for just a moment. “ _Friendship_. I’ve been in the Mabari kennel ever since he caught wind up what I’d done. It’s only today I was allowed back into the tower.”

“Ugh. Greagoir can go have a romantic dinner with a goat’s mother. Oh no, how dare one of my templars actually do a favour for a mage, Maker forbid anyone get to know whose leashes they’re holding.”

Her friend winced. “Things like that are one of the reasons he disapproves.”

“I did say ‘romantic’. I gave him a little bit of credit.”

“I mean referring to yourself as on a leash. And you know it.”

“This is a cage, Cullen,” Rosemary said softly. “It’s a pretty cage. A very pretty cage, and I understand why it’s needed, but let’s not pretend I’m free in here. The verse is ‘serve man’, remember?”

Cullen glanced to either side. “You’re going to get into trouble, saying things like that,” he answered in a low voice.

Rose dropped her eyes, knowing she’d crossed a line with the frustrations. “Somebody has to,” she muttered.

His gaze was on her as she looked up again. Thoughtful, pensive. “Can we… look, can we have a word? In private?”

“Very shady,” Rosemary managed to conjure some of her usual good humour from somewhere. “But all right, I’ll bite. It’s nearly lunch so most of the studies will be empty. Could steal a few minutes in there without being bothered.”

Cullen nodded, and they set off in silence. Few marked their presence, though Rosemary found herself watching for anyone keeping tabs on them. She knew that their friendship had set a few tongues wagging, but this was the first she’d heard of it actually landing Cullen in hot water. Maybe they’d have to be a little bit more discrete.

Soon enough, they reached one of the study rooms, and true to form, it was deserted.

Rosemary turned to Cullen. “Okay, can I guess the secret? Let’s see… ooh, you were only pretending to like those biscuits I baked last month!”

“Be serious for a second, would you?” Cullen snapped, then covered his forehead with a palm and sighed. “Sorry. When you’re on grounds duty at night for three straight weeks, you have little else to do but think, and this has, this has, well… been on my mind for a while.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Rose tilted her head to the side. “But don’t leave me in suspense. What’s up?”

“You know the… rumours about the two of us?”

“I’ve heard a couple. I assume you mean the ‘they’re totally getting it on’ ones and not the ‘they’re secretly related’ ones.”

“People think we’re…?” Cullen stopped and shook his head. “You know what, never mind, I don’t want to know. I was referring to the ones talking about us being… close.”

“We are close, Cullen,” Rosemary was beginning to feel an eerie sinking feeling in the pit of her gut, like she’d swallowed ice. “We’ve been friends for what, five years?”

“Not far from that,” Cullen glanced away, ran an anxious hand over the back of his head. “My point is that I, uhm, I… that is to say…” he tailed off, blushing in a way that was usually reserved for Rose’s most filthy jibes and most creative curses.

“You’re not saying much of anything right now,” Rose quipped, trying to quell her own rising unease with humour. It didn’t work.

“Maker. This is difficult. Rosemary I… believe I have feelings for you.”

And there it was.

Rosemary felt an aching in her chest, so intense that it was like being physically ill. She found her face twisting into a wry smile. “Cullen that’s… that’s very sweet of you.”

Cullen tentatively looked at her, and there was such hope in his eyes that for a moment, pure wracking guilt stole Rose’s breath away.

“I’m sorry but I can’t match that. You’re my friend, Cullen, my best friend, even, but… I can’t look at you in that way.”

In an instant, Cullen’s expression went flat. He thought he was good at hiding his emotions, but Rose had always been able to read him like a book. He was crushed. “I… why?” he sounded lost.

Rosemary shook her head. “I just can’t, I’m sorry.”

“Is this… is this because of the Knight-Commander? Because I’m a templar?”

“What? No!” her response was maybe a little strong, but hells if she was going to let him think that the bloody Knight-Commander would get between her and any object of her affections. It was… more complicated than that. “As if I’d let bloody Greagoir tell me how to feel.”

“I see,” Cullen grimaced. “It’s me, then…”

Rosemary looked down, hesitated for a long moment. This wasn’t something she wanted to talk about, but if she could tell anyone, it had to be Cullen.

“I, well, sort of. It’s not you, specifically. Actually I’d be, um, I’d probably be very happy to hear that you felt this way if you, you know, uh…” Rosemary squeezed her eyes shut. Maker, there wasn’t any easy way of saying it. “If you, well… were of a slightly more… womanly persuasion.”

Cullen blinked, and then stared. “I don’t – I’m not sure I understand.”

“You know that one apprentice that I wouldn’t shut up about a couple of years ago? Let’s just say it wasn’t her, um… scholarly pursuits that had me so interested in her.”

“I… oh…” a red tinge was creeping up Cullen’s neck. A home in his cheeks appeared inevitable. “I… I had no idea that you, um…”

Rosemary bit her lip. “It’s not something I’ve had an… easy time getting to grips with. I mean, honestly, I don’t even really know how _any_ of that type of thing is supposed to work, regardless of my partner. Mostly, I just know for absolutely definite that, well, if I was going to take anyone to bed or… or otherwise, it would be another woman,” she tried a smile on for size, just about managed it. “And I promise this isn’t an elaborate excuse. I enjoy talking to you Cullen. You actually put up with my rambling. I just… yeah.”

Cullen stood there silently, swallowed, and then almost seemed to startle himself back into concentration. “That’s- n-no I absolutely understand. Don’t worry about it,” he was blushing bright red now, squirming with embarrassment. Maker, she wished she didn’t have to let him down like that. If he was a girl, she would have jumped for joy hearing a confession like that one, and probably jumped into his arms to boot, hang what the Knight-Commander thought.

He, however, was very much a _he_ , and things had just got incredibly awkward incredibly quickly.

“I… I should get back to my post!” Cullen stammered out, retreating without giving Rosemary a chance to respond.

“Dammit,” she sighed. This was… this was going to be difficult to resolve. Not the ideal reaction she was hoping for her first time telling anyone she was gay, that was for certain.

Cullen was difficult to track down after that exchange. He always seemed ready with an excuse not to talk, and while they managed to slip back into their old pattern once or twice, he remained distant and inaccessible. Fantastic, Rosemary had always wanted to ruin one of her closest friendships.

Five days after that pair of confessions, she was dragged out of bed in the depths of night for the Harrowing.

 


	2. The Second Occasion: Ostagar

Travelling on the road was difficult and a little strange, summoning some old memories. It had been a long while since Rosemary had hopped her way along anything other than firm floors of stone or wood; not since the Alienage. Roads were uneven, sometimes damaged, and that was when they had the luxury of roads. Often, they had to go without, and that was a new chore all to itself.

Still, Rosemary adapted, as always, and the soreness was worth it for one very simple fact.

For the first time since she was a little girl, she was outside of the tower.

Admittedly leaving was faintly terrifying, not least because she was being _recruited_ , not just sent off as a healer or the like. She’d always figured that a life of studying and perhaps teaching lay ahead of her, and now here she was, barely out of apprenticeship, and she was to be a Grey Warden. Even thinking about that struck Rosemary as absurd. Surely, any moment now, she would wake up to find that this was a strange dream conjured by the experience of the Harrowing.

It would mean one of her best friends hadn’t lied to her and then escaped the Circle as a blood mage.

Rosemary loved Jowan like a brother, but _Maker_ that man had the most impressive knack for screwing up of anyone she’d ever known.

She wanted to say it was a mistake, anyway, make the excuse that he’d just stumbled upon the wrong tome and not realised what he was dabbling in until later. She didn’t really want to think about Jowan actively seeking out the knowledge to become a blood mage.

Fortunately, bothering Duncan about anything and everything was a good diversion from her thoughts. Rosemary had been a little intimidated by the man at first, but as always, that had quickly given way to curiosity and a barrage of questions. Blights, Grey Wardens, Denerim, places he’d journeyed to and people that he’d met. He was occasionally evasive, and Rosemary recognised the glazed over look that people sometimes got when she’d rambled too long, but for the most part, it made for a good way to pass the time. He had his own questions for her too, of course, though there wasn’t really a whole lot to tell. It was a little difficult to spin an interesting story out of ‘I lived in a tower for ten years and learned how not to let demons eat my brain.’

“I fear I may have recruited the most talkative mage in the circle,” he commented at the end of one anecdote about life in Kinloch Hold.

Rose smiled, a touch bashfully. “Captive audience. Don’t have any choice but to listen to me when you’re on the road together,” she quirked an eyebrow at him. “Having second thoughts about recruiting me, Duncan?”

Duncan laughed warmly. “On the contrary, your enthusiasm is refreshing,” he frowned briefly. “Many of our newcomers join the Wardens because they feel they have no choice, or else are unwanted by family or friends,” he paused, seeming to notice Rosemmary’s disquiet at this. “Do not worry yourself; our brothers and sisters form new bonds in time. You’ll just be starting off on a high note.”

“All right, fair enough,” she glanced to the veteran Warden. He’d done a lot for her in the short time they’d known one another. Who knew what consequences Greagoir’s wrath would have held if he hadn’t been there to intervene. “And Duncan? Thanks. I’m looking forward to it.”

He smiled. “We’ll see if your gratitude survives the first Darkspawn.”

“Can’t be any uglier than some of the templars,” Rosemary quipped, drawing a laugh.

 

* * *

 

 

Well. That was unexpected.

Of all the sights Rosemary was thinking would be there to greet her at Ostagar, the Maker-loving _King of Fereldan_ would not have ranked highly on the list. And it would have been on the list as a joke. That Duncan apparently knew King Cailan just made the whole thing that much more incredible.

And to boot, he’d introduced himself to her. Which meant Rosemary could say that she’d met the King.

If this was a dream, it was both the longest and most fantastical she’d ever had. She could base a _novel_ on this.

In any case, Duncan had sent her off to familiarise herself with the camp, and Rosemary was left to her own devices beyond the instruction to go and find someone called Alistair, another Grey Warden.

Food first, though. A hot meal would be nice after all that time travelling. Maker but she ached. Bounding around a tower was a different prospect entirely to marching for miles across roads and wilderness. Even her right arm, the crutch-bearing one, hurt, and that almost never happened.

Though, truthfully, she wasn’t really sure _where_ she could get something to eat. Dammit, maybe she should have spoken with that friendly-looking soldier. Rosemary stopped, hesitated, looked around. Well, there was a chantry sister overseeing some praying, some kind of forge, a tingling sense of magic from nearby – oh, of course there were mages here, the templars had been grumpy about that for weeks. It was probably what caused the ‘prank’ on her in the first place.

Nothing immediately screamed ‘here is food!’ though, and she wasn’t much in the mood to wander around until she found some. Maybe she’d go speak to that Alistair first, and he’d be able to point the way.

“You there, cripple!”

Rosemary stiffened up, turned around to see a surly man in armour stomping towards her. Another soldier, no doubt. Although she was –unfortunately- accustomed to having others talk unkindly about her impairment, it never failed to send a twist of outrage through her chest. As if that was all that she was, as if ‘one-legged’ was the sum total of her life. Hearing it never got any easier. In some ways, she prayed it remained hurtful; she didn't want to start just _accepting_ that.

“What are you doing here?” he asked as he drew up, looming over her. Most people loomed over Rosemary, in all fairness, but this man was _big_. “Camp followers aren’t supposed to be in this area.”

“Excuse me? I am not a camp follower!” Rosemary snapped. She wasn’t sure whether being called a servant or insulted was worse. Probably the servant part, since it was one she hadn’t heard before.

The soldier sneered. “Right, you’re a bloody warrior, obviously.”

“I’m a Grey Warden, thank you very much!” Rosemary felt heat rising to her cheeks, embarrassed and agitated. The templars had antagonised her sometimes, but they’d never been quite so… blatant about it.

Momentarily, the man looked taken aback, then he scowled. “Don’t get smart with me. Like the Wardens would take on a cripple.”

“They’ve been opening up opportunities for the disadvantaged,” Rosemary replied coolly. “You should look into joining; I’ve heard they’re particularly interested in recruiting the witless.”

His face reddened. “You’ve got a mouth on you, knife-ear.”

Oh, racism. Cute. All this bigotry was starting to make her nostalgic. “Sorry, those were some long words. I know they must be hard for you to understand.”

The soldier scowled, an ugly glare on his face. “If you don’t shut up, I’m going to knock your teeth-“

“Go hang, you festering pile of-“

“Is there a problem here?”

Dammit! That was going to be a good one!

Rosemary, cut off, looked to the side to see the interruption. A young man, couldn’t have been much older than her. His armour had the griffon emblem of the Wardens. Thank the Maker.

“No. Was just going to teach this insolent bitch a lesson.”

“And here’s you being so nice!” the sarcasm in the Warden’s voice made Rose give him another look. She hadn’t expected to be stuck up for.

“She said she was a Warden! Making fun of your lot!” the soldier protested.

“Yes, because elves can’t be Wardens.”

“It’s not that she’s a knife-ear. She’s a cripple!”

The Warden frowned. “Why don’t you let me handle this? You go on and do… whatever it is you like to spend your time doing. Banging rocks together, maybe.”

Fuming, the soldier stalked off, leaving Rosemary alone with the other Warden. She let out a shaky breath, trying to keep the anger from her face. It had been a long time since somebody had riled her up like that.

“Just warms the heart to see people pulling together in a Blight, doesn’t it?” Concern flitted across his expression. “He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

“If he’d tried, he would have been the one who ended up on the floor,” Rosemary replied, a little more vehemently than she’d intended.

The Warden gave her a closer look, studying her for a moment. “Wait, I think I know you. Heard about you, anyway. Duncan’s new recruit, right? It’s… was it Lavender?”

“Rosemary.”

He grinned sheepishly. “Right. I’m Alistair, good to meet you.”

“Likewise. Thanks for helping me out.”

“No problem,” he regarded her. “You know, when Duncan sent word about you, he mentioned the crutch. I assumed you’d had an injury, not that, you know…” Alistair gestured vaguely at leg level. Always with the limb. Maybe she should start having little cards made to hand out to people with an explanation.

“Oh. It’s a little known magical technique. Actually, the fewer points of contact you have with the ground, you more powerful your magic is. I’ve heard there’s a whole movement in Tevinter focused on teaching mages to cast spells standing on one leg. I’m just especially dedicated to the craft.”

Alistair laughed. “Maker, that’d be a sight,” he paused. “Oh, right… I’d forgotten you were a mage. I guess it seems obvious now. I doubt you’d be cut out for swinging a sword around. N-no offence, or anything.”

“None taken. Is my magic a problem?”

“Oh no, no, not at all, I just… well, I used to be a templar, so that can make things a little bit tense.”

Fan-bloody-tastic, a templar.

Somewhere in His realm, the Maker was laughing at her. 

Rosemary, with some effort, schooled her expression, keeping it carefully neutral. Here she was thinking that she’d be away from the templars’ armoured heel, and it turned out that one of the people she was going to be working with… unbelievable.

“So long as you don’t start smiting me, we should be good.”

Alistair opened his mouth to reply, but was forestalled by a loud gurgling from Rose’s stomach. The two of them exchanged glances for a second, and he smirked.

“Sounds like your guts are smiting you. I’ll show you to the mess, might be able to find the other recruits on the way there.”

Rosemary followed, telling herself that at least her new comrade had a sense of humour.

 

* * *

 

 

Fed, washed, and with a change of clothes, Rosemary would have liked to say that she was ready for her first task as a Grey Warden, but to do so would have been a blatant lie.

Going out into the wilds surrounding the camp.

To find and kill Darkspawn.

And collect their blood.

With three men she barely knew.

This Grey Warden business had sounded a lot more fun when it had all been griffons and heroics.

Oh Maker. Rosemary had never been in a fight in her life, how in the name of Andraste did she expect to be able to kill monsters? Her magical specialisations mostly focused on protective and warding spells, and her form with a staff was terrible, nothing like some of the elegant spellslinging she’d seen from other mages in the tower, casting fire and ice from their weapons like a mesmerising dance. By comparison, she was a clumsy child batting at butterflies with a stick.

Well. It was a little late to back out now.

Rosemary brought up the rear of the group, trailing just a little behind Ser Jory, the heavily armoured, heavily muscled knight who nevertheless had a gentle voice and a reserved manner. He reminded her of some of the kindlier templars, although she could tell from the slightly perplexed looks he kept shooting her that he was less confident in Rosemary’s abilities than she was his. That was fine, she wasn’t confident either.

Alistair, as their guide, was leading the way, followed closely by the final member of the group, Daveth. A thief and a pickpocket, apparently, though paradoxically the fact that he’d been so forthright about it made Rose trust him slightly more. If he had criminal designs, then he could easily have kept his past to himself, unlike her. She supposed it didn’t much matter now where they’d all originated from. Soon enough they’d be Grey Wardens.

It was a little strange seeing the reactions of the other two recruits to realising that she was a mage, a shocked kind of nervousness. Rosemary was so used to it just being common knowledge; nobody was going to be in a Circle except mages and templars, and it was blindingly obvious that she was no templar. She had to keep reminding herself that she was _outside_ now, that for most people, mages were an uncommon sight indeed, and a dangerous one, too. That was kind of the reason they got stuck into big towers with specially trained jailors.

Round about when Rosemary was considering the relative merits of having two heavily armed men afraid of her was when she saw her first darkspawn.

A squat, misshapenly ugly thing, bald, with unpleasantly grey skin, a mouthful of black fangs, and eyes that glittered with malice. The creature peered out of the nearby bushes, cautiously looking from side to side, almost reptilian in its movements.

It saw her. 

She stared at it.

It stared at her.

She stared at it.

It opened its mouth with a guttural growl.

Rosemary let out an inarticulate yell that could have been anything from a prayer to a curse, thrust forward her staff and unleashed a panicked bolt of energy so forceful that the air fizzed in its wake.

The spell smashed squarely into the darkspawn’s surprised face, and there was a crack, not unlike the snapping of a dry branch as its head whiplashed back.

It fell soundlessly and did not move.

Everyone turned to look at her, jaws dropping all around. Rosemary shuffled awkwardly, poking at the ground with her crutch.

“Uh… I got spooked.”

“If that’s your reaction to getting spooked, remind me never to sneak up on you!” said Daveth, staring with something that may well have been admiration.

“Perfect, just stay scared for the next few hours and we should have a pretty pile of dead darkspawn on our hands,” Alistair added.

“Constant fear of being killed by monsters? I can hardly wait,” Rose responded sardonically. Wasn’t much different from worrying about demons, she thought, but did not say. They had reason enough to be wary of her without providing reminders that she was at risk of a demon deciding it wanted to dine on her. She lived with that anxiety every day. It was private.

“So how are we to retrieve their blood?” Jory looked uncomfortable with the prospect.

Alistair grinned wryly. “Some good old fashioned maiming should do the trick. Be careful with the vials though; I broke one once and got blood all over my pack. Had to burn it. I liked that pack.”

“N…noted,” the man was slightly pale. Rosemary had to wonder if she wasn’t the only person here feeling a little over their head.

“Anyway,” Alistair sobered up. “We can’t stand around. Darkspawn to kill, treaties to find and all that. Off we go.”

Rosemary followed him. Her heart still hadn’t slowed from the frantic yammering it had broken into the moment she clapped eyes on the darkspawn. Maker, staying afraid was not going to be a problem, at this rate.

Well, in for a copper, in for a sovereign, right?

Hah. Like she’d ever had money.

 

* * *

 

“It’s empty.”

“Are you certain?”

“It’s a box, Jory. I can say with very reasonable confidence that it’s empty.”

“That’s not good,” Alistair was grim. “There aren’t really any more places to look.”

Alistair had that one right; the four of them had spent the past hour scouring every inch of the dilapidated tower that was supposed to house the treaties Duncan had sent them for. Between rot, collapsed stonework, and the damp, they’d failed to find anything of particular note.

“If you’d like, we can go and ask the darkspawn if they’ve seen anything,” Rosemary said playfully, poking a thumb over her shoulder.

“Not bloody likely!” exclaimed Daveth. “After the amount of them buggers we had to get past, I’m sure not sticking my neck out for a chat.”

“Then I suppose we must turn back,” Ser Jory made a face. “It’s a shame, but is this Joining not more important?”

“You have a point,” Alistair conceded. “I hate to disappoint Duncan, though…”

“Well, well, well, what have we here?”

Rosemary felt the intangible brush of magic against her before she even saw the owner of the voice, the faint prickling sensation of being studied by the arcane power of another. Mages in the circle hadn’t often done that; it was considered a little rude to prod at someone magically, so its use was generally reserved for lessons or the enchanters who just didn’t care what others thought of them.

_Apostate._

A woman with raven hair as dark as Rose’s own had stepped into the tower. Her eyes glowed with a strange light, and her features were striking.

_…Attractive apostate._

Rosemary grabbed a hold of herself. The mage part was more important right now. She looked alone, which was worrying; approaching of her own volition meant she was confident enough in her ability to defend herself from four others. Arrogant or powerful, both were equally as bad.

“Grey Wardens. On official business,” Alistair’s voice was guarded.

The woman’s gaze swept the group, then alighted on Rose.

“Aren’t you an interesting one? Tis a long way into these Wilds of mine for one with your limitations,” her tone had a curious cadence, a lilt that Rosemary had never encountered the like of before.

“I’m not as limited as you think. Who are you?”

“A witch of the wilds, she is!” Daveth’s voice trembled.

“A witch of the wilds! Such tall tales. Very well, elf; tell me your name and I will tell you mine.”

Biting back a remark about being the one who asked first, Rose took a hop forward. “Rosemary.”

“You can call me Morrigan, if you wish.”

 “All right, Morrigan, what are you doing here?”

She chuckled. “Tis not I whose presence demands explanation. I have tracked your presence for some time. A most valiant or foolish group, fending off these darkspawn, and now exploring a long-abandoned carcass,” her eyes lingered on Rosemary. If she’d been watching them fight, then she had to be aware that Rose was a mage, too.

“As I said, we’re Grey Wardens. I suggest you move on,” Alistair shifted his feet. His hand wasn’t far from his blade.

“Such hostility. A pity, tis clear that you sought something in this ruin, something that I, did I have a mind to, could assist you in finding.”

“Wait, did you steal the treaties?” Alistair bristled. “You’ve got a nerve, offering your-“

“Twas not I who removed them. The one you seek is my mother.”

Rosemary hesitated. “Well… will she give them back, then?”

Morrigan broke into a smile. “Twould seem that is a question you would have to ask her yourself.”

Rose glanced back to the rest of the group. Daveth still looked terrified. Jory was taciturn, Alistair glowering. Well, none of _them_ were going to say what needed to be said. Apostate or not, if this Morrigan could help them find the treaties, then it was worth swallowing a little pride.

Besides, Rosemary was curious about her. She’d been surrounded by nothing but mages and templars since she was a girl; Morrigan was the first mage she’d ever met outside of a tower. Dangerous? Perhaps, but also more fascinating than Rose would have given credit. The circle had constantly impressed upon her the dangers of unrestricted magic, the need for constant vigilance and security, and yet here was a woman in the thicks of the Kocari Wilds who at least appeared to be doing perfectly fine without a sword to her throat.

Kind of made Rosemary think, was all. Just because she was away from the circle now didn’t mean that it was no longer her problem or responsibility. Maybe if there wasn’t the threat of tranquillity or execution looming overhead, mages like Jowan wouldn’t have resorted to blood magic.

Annnnd this was exactly the type of thinking that had got her on Greagoir’s bad side. Whatever, she could worry about it later.

“Can you take us to your mother then?”

Morrigan tilted her head to the side, and then slowly smiled. “Follow me then, if you will.”

“I don’t like this,” murmured Jory. “We should be cautious.”

“She’ll throw us into the pot, she will!”

“Cheer up Daveth, I’ll bet they can’t eat a whole person. They’d need… oh I don’t know, a good couple of weeks to get through you.”

“You’re an arse, Rose.”

Rosemary grinned. “I know.”

Two hours later, Jory and Daveth were both dead.

By the end of the night, so was almost everyone else.


	3. The Third Occasion: On the Road

Rosemary spent much of her time travelling alternating between two very distinct mindsets. Either she was cursing every moment of the march, filling the air with such foul language that it made Alistair blush, or she was exulting in being out and around and active.

This was largely contingent on whether or not she’d had the opportunity to bathe within the past three days or so.

Circle life had definitely had its flaws, and now that Rosemary had been availed a taste of freedom, a taste of what it was like to not be watched every hour of every day, well, she certainly didn’t plan on going back any time soon. However, there were certain aspects of tower life that Rosemary had taken for granted that were very much not a guarantee for life on the road. Like not being rained on. Or having warm food every day. Or, yes, baths.

Rosemary _missed_ baths. She found herself fantasising about them as she hopped along the track, dwelling on just how nice it would be to slide into a warmed tub. It was growing almost into a little obsession; once or twice she’d caught herself wondering whether it was possible to borrow one from one of the isolated farmsteads they passed.

Bad plan. Alistair and her were wanted, if events in Lothering were any indication, and Rosemary was a very conspicuous kind of person; she didn’t need to give any more people a chance to remember her than was absolutely essential. Elves were common enough. Magically active elves missing a leg? That narrowed things down a great deal. Rosemary took pains to conceal her magic as best as she could, and at least, she supposed, she wasn’t flouncing around in robes, but any time they ran into trouble, well… Rose wasn’t exactly best equipped to defend herself without resorting to magic. Even were it not for the obvious issue, her height alone prevented her from doing a great deal.

Alistair had insisted she begin carrying a knife anyway though, just in case.

At some point, perhaps a little way outside Lothering, a strange realisation had come upon Rosemary, which was that her fellow Warden hadn’t just been asking her opinion on what they should do next, he was actually following her lead.

She wasn’t quite sure how to react to that.

Nobody had ever looked to her for direction. Up until right before she’d left the circle, she’d been an apprentice, so how could she be? Rosemary could make a case for maybe Jowan, but that had been more a matter of necessity than anything else. Her friend was such a walking disaster area that if she didn’t give him the odd nudge here and there the templars would have wound up throwing him out of a window from sheer frustration. She wondered how he was doing, now and then; it was a gross understatement that they’d not parted on the best terms. Regardless of the type of magic he’d revealed himself to practice, well… he was still her friend, Rosemary didn’t want the templars to get their hands on him.

The awkward part was that where Alistair had started things off, the others that they’d met had sort of just followed suit. Morrigan, naturally, was in no way inclined to take charge, seemingly more interested in making cutting remarks about anything and everything. Especially Alistair. There was Leliana, who, while most certainly nothing like any sister Rosemary had met in the Circle, had been the one to ask to join _them_ , which somewhat ruled out her as a leader. Rose liked Leliana; her accent was enthralling, and she always seemed to have a story to tell. They’d also picked up Sten in Lothering, the towering Qunari, a race that Rosemary had only read about in books. While he always seemed on the verge of outright mutiny, so far as he was concerned, she had released him, and so he went where she went.

There was also the dog, but the day Rosemary started asking a Mabari for advice was the day she found a nice quiet cave to continue her descent into complete insanity.

So now here they were, two Grey Wardens, an apostate, a warrior, a sister, and a dog. And somehow Rosemary had ended up in charge. Of course, with her vast inexperience in battle, towering stature of not-quite five feet tall and limited exposure to any environment outside of a Circle, she was the natural choice to lead.

Maker, she wasn’t sure if she should be gratified that the others had such faith in her or appalled that Alistair had so little confidence in his abilities that he genuinely thought that Rosemary was a better option than him.

Rosemary was startled out of her thoughts (currently of the ‘I hate everything, jump-on-a-cleric’s-pointy-hat this sucks’ variety) by the sounds of a commotion ahead. Yells, clashing blades; fighting, and coming from directly down the path, at that.

“Someone’s in trouble,” Rose called back to the others. “Sounds bad.”

“Tis merely a detour then,” said Morrigan as she stopped. “The undergrowth will not slow our progress overmuch.”

“Yeah we’re not doing that.”

“You mean to wait until the danger has passed?” Sten grunted. “Such a delay is not needful.”

“Maker, are you both- actually don’t answer that, of course you’re serious. We’re going to go help.”

“This is unwise,” the Qunari opined gravely.

“Thank you for your input, Sten. Still doing it.”

Rosemary began to move, putting out her crutch to hop along the road. She’d had time to adjust and acclimatise to walking for longer periods, and had steadily developed a somewhat more proficient manner of moving around on her crutch. It was ungainly and a little bit lopsided, but she’d never really had much grace, and overall, it was more important to make sure she wasn’t hampering her own agility. With the depressing regularity that people, darkspawn and creatures great and small were attempting to kill her these days, it had been a necessary lesson to learn. There was a moment of nothingness from behind her, and then Rosemary heard the others beginning to trail along behind her. She may not have known _why_ they looked to her as the leader, but at least the group followed through with it.

The noises of combat quickly grew louder, and Rosemary quickened her pace to match. This was reckless of her, she knew that, but was she just to sit idle while people could be in trouble? What if it was darkspawn? What if it was Loghain’s men, or some of the knights from Redcliffe they’d heard about back in Lothering?

What if it was just regular folks who’d ran into the wrong crowd on the road?

Grey Wardens were protectors, defenders. There wasn’t much point in standing up against the Blight if they would overlook those in need just because it might be dangerous.

…Oh _Maker_ she was turning into a character from one of those books Cullen was always reading then vehemently denying he’d been anywhere near, the ones with sickly sweet heroines who could do no wrong and always had to make sure they did what was right instead of what was easy, the ones with heroes riding gryphons and great battles and phrases like ‘for justice and honour!’ and everyone’s village had tragically burned to the ground or something. _And_ their parents were dead, or actually the villain all along, or the villain all along as well as dead.

She needed to stop doing the thinking thing.

Rosemary planted her crutch, pivoted around it, and turned the corner in the road to see who exactly was in trouble. A chaotic scene met her eyes, an armoured quartet standing back to back, hemmed in on all sides by – and yes, she could sense them now, hear the whispering in her head – _Darkspawn_. Even as she watched, one of the creatures lunged in, met with the broadside of one of the defender’s shields, the emblem upon it flashing a moment in the afternoon sun. 

The flaming sword was unmistakeable.

Shit. Templars.

More figures lay motionless on the ground, and not all of the bodies belonged to darkspawn.

Well, time to cross her fingers that Morrigan would be subtle.

 _Maker_. They were so screwed.

As Rosemary barrelled forward with a lopsided clattering of hops, hearing her companions beginning to charge along in her wake – and quickly outstripping her, in the case of Alistair, Sten, the dog – okay everyone really – it occurred to her that this was the moment where she should really, as the leader, be letting out some kind of inspiring war cry. Get everyone fired up, and all that! And not at all to distract herself from the fact that the darkspawn were no less terrifying here than they’d been at Ostagar or any subsequent meeting.

“ANDRASTE ON A FLAGPOLE KILL THOSE BASTARDS!”

…Good enough.

The darkspawn surrounding the templars were completely unprepared to be attacked from the flank, much less by a greatsword-wielding Qunari, a full-grown Mabari and a Warden at top momentum. Leliana was already beginning to hum, carrying a jaunty tune even as she notched arrows to her bow and unerringly found her mark in darkspawn bodies.

But there were a lot of darkspawn. Hurlocks, Genlocks, and some kind of smaller, screeching variety that Rosemary had never seen before, emaciated and armed with cruel claws. After the initial impact of the charge broke their lines, the mob reformed, striking back as Sten laid about himself with his sword, Alistair brought up his shield in defensive stance to deflect what he could. The group’s numbers had shifted the tide, but this was far from decisively over.

Well, it seemed that she had little choice.

Here was hoping that the templars would be grateful enough not to think too much about all of this.

Extending her free hand, fingers spread wide, Rosemary reached within herself and brought forth a surge of revitalising energy. It flowed warm, up from her chest and then along her shoulder, through her arm, heating it to the core, a silvered wind emerging from her palm and dancing outward. Rose narrowed her eyes, focusing, concentrating, willing the winding tresses onward, encircling her companions with protective magic. Then, with a little more effort, a little more coaxing of her own reserves, extending further, to the group of templars, bringing them under her renewing aegis.

In spite of being in the midst of combat, Rosemary found a half smile creeping across her face. This was what she loved about being a mage. She didn’t need to worry about lagging behind or inconveniencing others, she didn’t have to grit her teeth and put up with insults or unwanted concern. She was good at it. She enjoyed it.

A frigid cascade of howling ice shot past Rosemary’s shoulder, enveloping a group of darkspawn and freezing them solid. She was snapped out of her reverie in an instant. There, of course, was the rest of what it meant to be a mage. Some of the rest, anyway.

Bolstered by Rosemary and Morrigan, given screening fire by Leliana, the frontline combatants of the group cut their way through the remaining darkspawn, assisted by the group of templars, who seemed to take the reinforcements as a sign to renew their efforts twofold.  One by one – sometimes in pairs when Sten gave a particularly vigorous swing of his blade – the darkspawn fell, until at last, the battleground was left silent apart from the panting of exertion.

“Everyone all right?” Rosemary called as she moved forward, gaining nods from Alistair and Sten, an affectionate lick from the dog. One of the templars removed their helm, revealing a young-looking woman with a dishevelled shock of blonde hair. She looked pale, haggard.

“Better than we would have been without your assistance, that’s for certain. The Maker has turned his gaze upon us today.”

Rosemary’s eyes dropped to the corpses strewn across the road, noting the half-dozen that belonged to templars. “I’m just sorry we couldn’t get here sooner.”

The woman shook her head, though a flicker of grief disrupted her stoic expression. “Few enough would have intervened to face darkspawn.”

“Oh, you know, all part of the job descript…tion,” Rosemary trailed off, but it was too late. _Maker_ , why could she never keep her mouth shut?

The blonde templar looked at Rosemary for a long few seconds. “I’m glad you said that. I didn’t think I would have the steel to try and arrest you as an apostate after the help you gave us. I’d have felt guilty about it for weeks.”

Rosemary took a guarded hop backward. Alistair and Sten closed ranks with her, standing protective on either side.

The templar held up her hands. “You misunderstand. You’re a Warden; that puts you beyond our jurisdiction. And frankly I’m glad of it; we’re having enough trouble with mages without trying to bring in someone who actively helped us.”

Rose blinked, a chill creeping its sinuous way down her spine. “Trouble with mages?”

She hesitated. “This is… this is supposed to be a private matter but…” she looked Rosemary up and down. “I know you, I’m sure of it; not many mages fit your description. You have a right to hear this. There’s been… a situation at Kinloch Hold.”

A double-take, and Rosemary realised that she _had_ met this woman before – or seen her, more accurately. One of the younger knight-lieutenants from the circle tower, though they hadn’t crossed paths often. But in that case, what was she doing so far afield? Surely they weren’t still trying to track down Jowan.

“I would very, very much like it if you're meaning the kind of 'situation' where Greagoir is grumpy because they don’t have any more sausages in the mess, and he's sent you out for emergency supplies.”

The knight-lieutenant managed a faint facsimile of a smile. “It’s not. We’ve lost control of the tower. Don’t ask me how, I don’t know; abominations started pouring out from the upper floors. It was all that we could do to seal the tower off.”

Abominations in the circle. Her home. People she knew, grew up with. Oh Maker.

Then, a horrifying thought arrived. “If the Circle is in such a state, then why are you here?”

The templar looked away. “…We’re going to Denerim,” she said, without meeting Rosemary’s eye. “The knight-commander is requesting the Rite of Annulment.”

That couldn’t be true, that couldn’t be real. To hear that there were abominations and demons was bad enough, but that Greagoir had forsaken the tower and everyone in it as lost? That he was condemning everyone she’d ever known to die?

Rosemary turned to the others. “Change of plans everyone. Redcliffe later, circle tower now.”

There was a moment as that sank in. Alistair, face pale, nodded. He had been a templar, he knew exactly the ramifications of what was being discussed. Morrigan was indifferent as always, Leliana took it in silently. And Sten…

Sten’s face went hard - harder. “I have studied the maps. This route will cause us delays in our objectives.”

“Sten. Did you or did you not say that you were going to follow me?”

The qunari paused. “That is correct.”

“We are _going_ to Kinloch Hold, Sten. If we don’t get there quickly, there might not be any allies left to recruit. Are we understood?”

Sten nodded slowly. “As you say,” he stepped back and fell silent.

The knight-lieutenant glanced across the group. “Interesting company you keep Warden, but then, you were one of the ones always driving the knight-commander to distraction, if I recall,” she hesitated, and the last trace of her smile fell from her face. “I… cannot tarry on our path, it would be dereliction of my duties. But… for the sake of the circle, I will pray that you reach Kinloch Hold before we can return from Denerim. Perhaps you can succeed where we failed.”

“I appreciate that, knight-lieutenant,” Rosemary murmured.

“I wish I could do more for you,” the woman looked back to the trio of surviving templars, and then took a step forward, close to Rose, leaning her head in. “If you find yourself in need of assistance from the templars when this is done, then… I cannot promise you anything, but ask for knight-lieutenant Kinnas,” the templar leaned back away, and Rosemary tilted her head to the side.

She wasn’t entirely certain what had just been offered to her. A friend in the templars? A favour?

Maybe it would be worth something, she didn’t know.

“I’d wish you good luck, but well… yeah. Please don’t take offence to the fact that I hope your journey to Denerim is as inconvenient and Maker-damned slow as possible,” Rosemary filled the silence, as she always did, with words.

Kinnas managed a tired laugh. “So long as there are no more darkspawn, I can understand the sentiment.”

“ _Pashara_ ,” Sten said. “We waste time talking.”

Rosemary sighed. He was right, of course. The longer they stayed here, the more likely the situation at Kinloch Hold was to deteriorate, and they already needed to plot a new route to accommodate the change in direction.

Still, it didn’t feel right just leaving.

“Can we help give your comrades their rites?”

Kinnas’ pale eyebrows rose. “Of course,” the woman bit her lip, and surely Rosemary imagined it, but for a second there seemed to be tears in her eyes. “So many mages view us as just jailors and tyrants. It’s- I cannot really tell you what it means that you’d not only save our lives, but help us commend our fallen’s souls to the Maker.”

Rosemary could almost _feel_ the roll of the eyes from Morrigan, but mercifully, the apostate remained silent. Although nobody else spoke to object or support, the slight smiles from both Alistair and Leliana told Rose everything that she needed to know.

They watched the pyre burn in solemn silence and then, with the briefest of farewells, the two groups parted to continue on their way.


	4. The Fourth Occasion: Broken Circle

“There it is. Home sweet home.”

Rosemary stood at the edge of Lake Calenhad. Across the dark, still waters was the monolithic spire of the circle tower, Kinloch Hold. An island on a lake, a stone tower patrolled by guards and which couldn’t be reached except by boat.

But the circle wasn’t a prison, right?

“I could see the tower on clear days in Redcliffe,” said Alistair. “Looks like a lovely place, doesn’t it? I like what they’ve done with the foreboding architecture and joyless stone walls. Adds character.”

“It’s even more charming when you live there,” just looking at the tower brought back memories, not all of them good. There must have been worse places to grow up, and she’d had friends, close ones, in the cases of Jowan and Cullen, there’d been Irving, and some of the other enchanters had been kind. Then of course, though, there were the templars. Strange to think that Rose had only seen Kinloch Hold from here three times; when she’d been brought into the Circle as a child, leaving with Duncan, and now returning to, to well…

Save those inside? Stop Greagoir from having the opportunity to enact the Rite of Annulment? Hearing about it felt like a bad dream. _Nobody_ in the Circle talked about Annulment, nobody wanted to contemplate it. The idea that everyone there could just be unilaterally sentenced to death was absolutely terrifying. Indeed, beyond the scattered information that Kinnas had given her, Rosemary didn’t have the first idea what was going on in there. ‘Suddenly, abominations!’ didn’t particularly give a clear picture of what had happened. _Something_ extreme must have taken place; there was always the threat of demons and possession, but to outright lose control of the tower to abominations? It was one thing for fighting to break out, it was quite another for the templars to _lose_ that fight.

In Rosemary’s time in Kinloch Hold, there had been a handful of occasions when the templars had been called into action – not just as the sentinels standing watch over them, the other side of their duties. The side that took them from guardians to executioners.

Apprentices a little older than Rose who never returned from their Harrowings, whose absences went unexplained and the templars refused to discuss; which told everything without a word passing the lips. Mages like Jowan deemed ‘dangerous’ and consigned to Tranquility, none of them having the fortune to have willing accomplices to aid in an escape. And then, when Rosemary was fourteen or so, a sudden scream from across the library, a scream from the very top of the lungs. One of the enchanters, clutching at their chest, writhing, an unearthly glow surrounding their hands… and then the shout was cut off in an instant as the blade of a templar plunged into the mage’s throat.

The stain on the patterned carpet had never come out.

‘He fell prey to a demon’, the templars said after that, regretful only insofar as it was a dead mage on their watch.

Rosemary understood that; truly she did, though knowing why she was imprisoned didn’t much serve to make her feel better about it. What chilled her about the events that had taken place – were still taking place in that tower was that the templars had never shied away from doing what had to be done. Calling for outside help didn’t just mean that Greagoir thought that the Circle was beyond hope, it meant that the templars out and out couldn’t fight what was in there. Sending ten men – led by a knight-lieutenant at that – to deliver the message spoke volumes as to the straits they had to be in. You didn’t send a force like that unless sending out word was so important that failure couldn’t be risked.

“This is where you keep your mages?” Rosemary thought that Sten sounded disgruntled, but she couldn’t be totally certain. Mildly dismissive aloofness was more or less his default state. The qunari grunted. “I do not understand this country.”

“What’s not to understand?” asked Alistair. “The Circle lets mages study while avoiding endangering others. Well. In theory, anyway.”

“Putting up stone walls around mages is not safety, it is complacency. Saarebas do not become harmless simply because they are out of sight.”

“We’re wasting time with this,” murmured Rosemary. “We need to find out what’s going on. We need allies and… and I grew up there.”

For better or for worse, it was home, and her home was under siege from within.

 

* * *

 

 

“What do you mean, Carroll brought the boat across? I gave direct orders for no one to be allowed access to the tower!”

Greagoir’s voice was unmistakeable as the doors to the tower swung open ahead of Rosemary, hauled aside by a pair of templars. She’d heard that voice almost every day for over ten years, it was etched into her memory.

“Sorry Knight-Commander, but I thought I might have forgotten something in my rooms. I promise, I’ll be in and out before you know it.”

The armoured figure standing in the tower’s lobby went ramrod stiff, then swivelled around. The iron grey hair and beard, the templar armour, those were familiar. The blood splattering Greagoir’s gauntlets, greaves, breastplate, that wasn’t.

Through clenched teeth, the Knight-Commander addressed her. “I hope you’ve come here for reasons other than to make jokes, Surana.”

“I’m here because I heard the Circle was in trouble.”

Greagoir frowned. “How could that be? We’ve been under strict lockdown,” his glower deepened. “Although apparently that fact escaped Carroll.”

“We had a run-in with knight-lieutenant Kinnas, she’s on her way to Denerim for the Rite of Annulment,” Rosemary looked closely at the man who had bared the doors of her cage for most of her life. They’d never got along, but Greagoir hadn’t struck her as cruel. “Are things truly so dire you’d put everyone in the tower to the sword?”

For a moment, Greagoir’s expression softened. “I know how this must look to you, but I would not invoke the Rite without reason. The Circle is on the verge of collapse; I lost half of my men just to secure the doors. If we cannot retake the tower alone, then for the safety of all, we must send for reinforcements, and I cannot ask for reinforcements unless I treat the situation with the gravity it deserves.”

Rosemary’s eyes dropped. Hearing it from the man himself, hearing the resignation in his voice… he believed what he was saying, whether he was right or not.

Rosemary looked back to him. “Let me go in there.”

“Out of the question. I’d be throwing another mage onto the pyre.”

She took a hopping step forward, drew herself up to her full height. Greagoir still towered over her, but that didn’t stop her from fixing her eyes on his. “I’m a Grey Warden now, Greagoir, and honestly, considering your knight-lieutenant wouldn’t be alive right now if it weren’t for us, I’d say you owe me a favour.”

“Kinnas is a very competent woman, Surana, I doubt that she needed saving-“

“Darkspawn, Knight-Commander. Have you forgotten there’s a Blight going on?” Rosemary slowly exhaled. “Please, Greagoir. This is my home too. If there’s any chance that there are survivors, then I can’t just walk away. And, and well, even if…” she swallowed, then pushed on. “Even if they’re all dead, then I can at least help make the tower safe. I need allies against this Blight, one way or another.”

The templar sighed heavily. “I understand. Very well, but if we send you through those doors, they will not be opened again until Irving is in front of me telling me the Circle is liberated.”

Rosemary’s mouth was dry. She didn’t want to raise this possibility, and yet knew she had to. “And if he’s dead?”

“Then the Circle will truly be lost. If you find his-“ Greagoir’s voice hitched for just a second. “His body, we will clear out the rest of the tower with you.”

“I’ll find him, Knight-Commander.”

Greagoir nodded, then hesitated. For several long seconds, he just regarded her silently. Then, at last, he spoke.

“I always thought you to be a troublemaker, Surana; even when you were young, I could see you frowning and shaking your head at the sisters, always getting on the wrong side of my men. When you grew older, it became clear enough that I was right. You certainly weren’t as quiet about your views as you thought you were. After the situation with Jowan, even had you remained, I’m certain it would only have been a matter of time before you broke the rules again and forced my hand into more drastic measures,” he paused, shook his head. “And yet here you stand, willing to put yourself at risk for the sake of everyone else. It seems one can be both a troublemaker and a fine mage. Thank you for your assistance, and good luck.”

There was a sudden sharp _seizing_ sensation in the bottom of her chest, so intense that she almost couldn’t breathe, so abrupt that it took a moment for Rosemary to realise that the emotion was _anger_.

How dare he? How dare he call her a fine mage in the same breath as implying he would have made her Tranquil? What was the bloody point of the Circle and the templars if you could have _good_ mages that were nevertheless too dangerous? Too… troublemaking?

That. Bastard.

“I’m not doing this for you, _templar_ ,” she spat it like a curse, and she meant it as one. “I’m doing this for them.”

She stalked past him, the tip of her crutch striking the stone hard enough for the clacking to echo across the room.

 

* * *

 

 

Rosemary opened her eyes to surroundings familiar and foreign all at once.

A well-swept wooden floor. Plain, unadorned walls. The smell of something cooking in the air.

She was lying on a bed; small, but then so was she, and the blanket beneath her was soft and dry.

“Rosemary!” the voice was warm, just a little sing-song, and one that Rosemary hadn’t heard since she was a child. “I need a hand with something, can you come through a moment?”

The frown on her face melted away. Her mother, of course, how could she have forgotten? With the Blight over and no more need for her services in the Wardens – at least for the time being, Rosemary had taken the opportunity for a well-earned break. It had been whim that had taken her to Denerim, a flight of fancy really. She hadn’t had the opportunity to explore the city of her birth as an adult, and now that she was a hero and all, she could indulge that kind of desire.

It still hadn’t really sank in. Probably why she’d been confused after waking up. For the Blight to not just be over, but for her – and Alistair, of course – to have the credit for it. For the first time in her life, Rosemary had respect. People actually came up to her in the street to _thank_ her for what they’d done, on a handful of occasions, even admitting that they’d made mistakes in their treatment of elves or mages. One man had apologised profusely for both of those things, so distraught that she’d almost felt bad for him.

The lot of her people, those of her race and those with her gift… well, it wasn’t going to improve overnight, but for once, Rosemary was actually hopeful. Humans taking notice, finding something to respect, that was the first step towards making things better. Shame it had taken the almost literal doom of Fereldan for bigots to open their eyes; it was something of a miracle her actions had made it through to anyone at all.

Regardless, Rosemary’s newfound fame had given her the run of Denerim, more or less, and she’d taken quite some delight in seeing what exactly the city had to offer. Though, with what had happened, she found it a little difficult to remember just what she’d seen. Excitement dulling the memories, she supposed. She’d have another chance to look around. Rosemary at length had returned to the streets of her childhood in the Alienage, wandering, not quite with any objective in mind. Things were different – of course they were, it had been over a decade, but just familiar enough to feel a powerful surge of nostalgia as she stood underneath the towering vhenadahl tree, marvelling at how it seemed just as big and strong as always. Then, as she’d looked back around to her surroundings, Rosemary saw a couple standing nearby. Middle-aged, but proud, joyous.

…She’d seen them, and they’d seen her.

Her parents.

It had been like something out of a storybook. She’d _known_. It didn’t matter that Rosemary hadn’t seen them since she was a child, had only vague memories of caring, soothing voices. She’d _known_. The jet black hair, the open faces, the pale blue eyes, the surprised, delighted smiles. The first instant she’d heard them speak, emotion had overwhelmed her.

She was home.

It hadn’t seemed like too much of an imposition to stay a night, and then another night, and then a third. Her childhood home was just as same as she remembered it in those snatches of recollections she had, and spending so much time there had swiftly filled in the gaps. The door that didn’t quite close properly, the squeaky floorboard that always rocked if you stepped on it, the knothole in the rafters directly above Rosemary’s bed.

Yawning from her nap. Rosemary stretched and swung herself into a seated position.

“Coming, mamae!” she called back, reaching for her crutch out of habit, planting it onto the floor and then pushing herself up to her…

…feet.

A flicker of a frown crossed over her face. That couldn’t be right, could it? Rosemary looked down and just stared. Two legs. She had two legs. She rocked slightly, and if it wasn’t for her crutch, she would have fallen. The balance was strange, so completely alien to what she was used to. She’d not stood on two feet since, since… ever.

“Rose!”

She started, snapping from her thoughts, and looked back up again. Right, right, her mother needed her. She could think about this in… in a little while. Yes.

Rosemary headed across the room, struggling a little to orient herself. It was difficult to walk when she was so used to hopping around, and even with her crutch, she was limping heavily. There didn’t appear to be anything wrong with the limb, other than the fact that it… existed. A right leg. _Her_ right leg.

That was wrong, wasn’t it? There had to be some kind of explanation, yet it eluded her grasp as she groped through her thoughts.

“There you are, sleepyhead.”

Again, Rosemary was drawn away from thinking about that too hard as she smiled sheepishly at her mother. It seemed that even heroic Grey Wardens were not immune to being chided by their parents, and honestly, she wouldn’t have it any other way. Scoldings made her feel like she was actually normal in a life that was anything but. Nice to be able to rest for a while, especially amongst the family that she’d long since thought lost. Soon enough she’d be called back to Warden business; though even that had a sense of optimism about it. Difficult to get overly worried about mopping up darkspawn stragglers when they’d managed to kill the biggest one of the lot.

Rebuilding the Order would come next; she and Alistair would be able to do that if they put their heads together, especially if they enlisted help from Orlesian Wardens. They could restore what was lost at Ostagar, make sure that this kind of destruction never happened again.

“Sorry, mamae,” Rose replied. “Saving the country can be tiring work. I think I’ll be sleeping off that time on the trail for a year.”

Her mother chuckled. “I suppose I can let you off this time. Can the hero valiantly aid me in defeating this horde of potatoes?”

Rosemary smiled. “It depends, is there a reward for my assistance?”

“I have only dinner to offer to you, oh mighty Grey Warden.”

“Payment fit for a king!” Rosemary declared, attempting to keep a straight face and failing miserably. “I shall do everything in my power to see the potatoes slain!” Of course it would turn out that she’d inherited her sense of humour from her mother, among other things. The hair, the eyes, even the height, although much to Rose’s chagrin, she still lost out in that regard. Even defeating a Blight couldn’t cause one to suddenly crack five feet tall.

Her mother passed across a small bowl of potatoes, and Rosemary set to peeling them, a touch awkwardly. She’d never really picked up the knack for cooking in her time on the road; Leliana, Morrigan, and even Alistair were better at it than she was. Fortunately vegetables weren’t exactly the most challenging of foes, but considering the mess Rose had managed to make of the cooking utensils the one time she’d tried to put together a meal at camp, she couldn’t leave anything to chance. It was quite a feat to be unanimously banned from catering for the party.

Regardless, Rosemary gave it a game effort, struggling mightily against the fiendish powers of the vegetable menace. She didn’t even have call to use healing magic this time, so overall she could say it was a win. Her mother hummed snatches of tunes in the background, bustling to and fro, preparing other parts of the meal. The lyrics were always just a little too faint to hear. Would it be childish, Rosemary wondered, to ask her mother to teach her a few of those songs before she had to leave?

“So, Rosemary.”

Rose paused, the curled strip of potato skin in her hand as she worked her way around it with the knife. That was a very anticipatory kind of statement. It was the opening to something.

“Mm?”

“I’m sure you had plenty of time on your travels to get to know your fellow hero. Are you sweet on the lad?”

Rosemary made a strangled noise that was something between a laugh and an appalled groan. Maker’s breath, her and _Alistair_ of all people? He was friendly, lovely, really, and he had rather the biting sense of humour when he wasn’t stumbling over his words, but fancying him? For one thing, she’d scarcely known him a few short months, for another, he was a man…

O-oh. It occurred to her that she hadn’t informed anyone of her sexuality since Cullen. Certainly not the parents she’d been separated from before she was old enough to really know anything about that. Rosemary had known a handful of mages back at Kinloch Hold who had preferred the company of their own gender, but she’d just always found it an awkward topic. Relations amongst the magi were hardly unheard of, but any form of sex education or open reference to the matter? Forget about it. She knew there wasn’t anything wrong with her orientation; sexuality had just wound up being a subject she never really needed to broach; nobody outside Cullen had ever expressed that kind of interest in her, even purely physically.

A frown creased her brow for a moment. Kinloch Hold. They’d gone there en route to ending the Blight, hadn’t they? It was weird, she couldn’t quite remember exactly what had happened. The Circle had been in danger and they’d… what had they done?

Her mother gave her a knowing grin, and Rosemary realised she was taking the hesitation as an admission.

“I uh… no, mamae. Alistair is just a friend.”

She chuckled. “You’re certain there’s no special someone for your father and I to disapprove of?”

Rosemary flushed. “If there was, I’d certainly be sparing her your scrutiny.”

“Her?” her mother’s eyes twinkled.

“I- um, well… yeah,” Rosemary was all of a sudden extremely invested in this bowl of potatoes. They- they weren’t going to finish peeling themselves!

The older woman giggled girlishly. “It’s all right, darling, it’s not my place to judge. You just do whatever makes you happy, okay?”

Rosemary swallowed, a sudden lump in her throat. That… that meant more than she thought it would.

“…Thanks,” she said quietly, scuffing the back of a sleeve across her eyes.

“I’ll be sure to tell your father not to go into your room if you bring any pretty girls home,” she winked.

“Mamae!” Rosemary spluttered, trying not to laugh. Her mother gave a wicked cackle as Rose blushed pink to the tip of her ears again.

There was a sound from the entryway, and Rosemary, thanking the Maker for the distraction, turned to see her father standing in the doorway, a soft smile on his face. Although his dark hair was salted with grey, he still stood tall, broad in the chest. It was nice that time hadn’t stolen away the strength of a parent that she scarcely remembered.

“I’m glad to see you’re settling in, Rosemary. Have you thought about how long you’re staying?”

Rosemary gave a slight shrug. “I don’t want to take advantage of your hospitality, mabae.”

He clicked his tongue. “Don’t be ridiculous. You’re our daughter, and this is the first time we’ve seen you since you were a girl. You can stay as long as you wish.”

“I…” it was a struggle to get the words out. “Thank you, mabae, that means a lot. I’ll have duties to get back to sooner or later though.”

He smiled indulgently. “I’m sure those can wait a while. The Wardens will understand their hero wanting to spend some time with her parents.”

Rosemary returned it tentatively. “I suppose you’re right. I’ve earned a rest.”

She reached out for her crutch, propped up against the wall, taking hold of it to take a couple of awkward steps towards her father and give him a hug. He took her in his arms, warm and paternal, and then tousled her hair.

“Still getting around on that thing, are you? It seems like a bit of a waste.”

Rosemary glanced down to the prop. “It’s… it’s habit, I suppose. I…” the thought was fuzzy and indistinct. Why was it a habit that should be broken? Of course, she had two legs now but… but why was that?

“Don’t tell me you went through all of that effort studying magic to restore yourself just to keep hobbling around!”

Rosemary frowned. Right, yes, that was it… wasn’t it? She’d spent some of the time after defeating the Blight in Kinloch Hold, studying methods of healing magic. At first it had just been an attempt to expand her own knowledge, but then she’d stumbled upon some spells that seemed to indicate not just the ability to mend wounds and knit together bones, but to replenish lost flesh… or replace missing parts.

It had taken quite some considerable effort to piece everything together, and at times, Rose hadn’t thought that it was going to work. However, just as she was on the verge of giving up, she’d made a breakthrough; she had Morrigan’s expertise in shapeshifting to thank for that. Armed with that knowledge, Rose had crossed her fingers and taken the plunge.

And it had worked. By the grace of Andraste, it had worked. She’d given herself the limb that she’d never possessed. She could _walk_ again.

C…couldn’t she?

The memories felt odd. Greasy, almost. Visible from a distance, but slippery, sliding between her fingers whenever she tried to properly grasp them. She could see them, remember them, and yet the moment she attempted to study them closely, they danced away again. There was something strange, they didn’t quite _feel_ right.

“Rosemary, are you okay?” her mother’s voice was full of concern and Rose blinked once, twice, hard. “You looked like you were a thousand miles away.”

“I… I’m fine. I just…” she scrunched her eyes shut, opened them again. That pervasively odd feeling wasn’t going away, if anything, it was getting even stronger. Replacing a lost body part – that wasn’t any kind of normal magic. In fact, that sounded dangerously similarly to practices that she’d heard described as blood magic.

She shook her head quickly. “I just need a moment to myself. To think. I’ll have a walk around.”

A walk around. A walk around. Something she’d never been able to do, and yet had never really felt all that bothered by. That she lacked a leg was just part of who she was. Other people were the ones that had always seemed to have a problem with her disability, not her. Why should she? Rosemary was Rosemary, missing leg and all. Without her experiences growing up, then she wouldn’t be the same person. She’d adapted, overcome. Why would she…

“A walk? But dinner is almost ready!” there was a hard note in her mother’s voice that there hadn’t been before.

“Yes, dear, don’t you want to stay with us?”

Rosemary swayed unsteadily, balance suddenly off kilter. No, this wasn’t right at all.

She wouldn’t do that. She wouldn’t treat her leg as something to be fixed, because it didn’t _need_ fixing. Different, perhaps, but different didn’t mean bad. Rose had got along perfectly fine her entire life without resorting to blood magic to solve a problem she wasn’t sure really existed.

“N-no,” she managed. “I _really_ think that I need some air.”

“But you have everything you want here!” the strength in her father’s voice had faded, replaced by a plaintive wheedling. His skin had gone sallow, his posture stooped, crooked fangs glistening in his mouth. “Parents who love you, the Blight over, and you are whole!”

“Ssstay with us,” it was almost a hiss. Her mother had more muzzle than face, eyes sunken black pits. “Don’t go back to being maimed and miserable…”

Rosemary clenched her teeth, reaching deep inside for the reserves of her magical energies.

“I…”

Hopping around the Circle, making her own way, never worrying about what the others thought.

“Am not…”

A Grey Warden – its own struggle, but never letting her crutch be a hindrance to fighting the darkspawn, to doing the right thing.  

“BROKEN!”

She screamed it out, and a blast of power radiated from her. The faces of her parents – barely even resembling elves, let alone her family, were torn asunder, and the illusion shattered in an instant, the surroundings of a home she didn’t truly remember dissolving into shredded rags.

Rosemary collapsed, gasping, her crutch clattering to the floor. She fell hard, nothing beneath her to cushion her fall, smacking her knee heavily.

Her knee. Back to one leg. Back to normal.

She took ragged breaths, trying to see where she was, but she knew without even looking. She could taste it on the air.

The Fade, she was in the Fade. The demon had – yes, now she remembered. Maker, it had ensnared all of them.

Painfully, Rosemary levered herself up onto her foot. There was no time to waste; her comrades needed help.

And she needed to cleanse her head of the dream that had nearly enthralled her.

 

* * *

 

 

With a singing _thwip_ , Leliana’s arrow shot through the air and buried itself in what passed for the head of an abomination. As the creature slumped, the room fell still.

Rosemary lowered her staff. She felt as if she was about to be sick. This was too much; floor after floor of demons and monsters, possessions not just of mages and templars, but people that she _knew_ , people that she’d grown up with. The scant handful of survivors as they fought their way up the tower was little comfort against the backdrop of wholesale carnage and slaughter. Nothing Kinnas or Greagoir told her could have prepared Rosemary for this. The stones of Kinloch Hold ran red with blood, and the further they made it, the more helpless Rosemary felt.

What was the point if they couldn’t save anyone? It was difficult to call protecting others from the consequences of the tower falling a worthy goal, not when such … protection came from a massacre.

Each new sight wrenched her heart further, until she felt that it was torn bleeding from her chest. Classrooms and studies she’d spent her life inside ransacked and ripped to pieces, the library in disarray, shelves toppled. And then there was worse; the crumpled bodies of templars, their armour crushed like paper, if even enough of them remained to identify the mail. Scraps of robes and splinters of staffs, their owners nowhere to be found. Then those robes whose owners very much still occupied them… along with demons sharing the skin.

Seeing an abomination was one thing. Knowing who it had once been was fit to shake her to the very core.

And they knew, too. They whispered and crooned her name, even as the group fought against them. Rosemary didn’t know how Wynne, the older mage, the enchanter who had _taught_ some of these mages, could even stand it.

“Rosemary, are you all right?”

The Orlesian-accented voice drew Rose out of her thoughts, making her realise that she’d just been stood staring at a wall for… she wasn’t even sure. Rose turned to see Leliana watching her, and plastered on her gamest effort at a smile. It wasn’t a good one.

“Would you believe me if I said yes?”

“Honestly? No.”

Paradoxically, that did actually make Rosemary smile for real. The worried crease across the other woman’s brow made her concern plain enough. If nothing else, at least Rose still had friends.

“I’ve certainly been better,” Rosemary admitted after a brief pause. “But too much depends on this for me to… to let this get to me.”

“Do not lose hope,” Wynne said gently, but the older woman’s voice was tired, worn. “Our Circle is a resourceful bunch, and Uldred did not have the support of everyone. There will be more survivors.”

“We should not linger here,” Sten rumbled. “It is not safe, and there will be more Saarebas in need of a swift death.”

“Maker’s breath, man!” Rosemary jumped at a sudden and uncharacteristic outburst from Alistair. “Would it kill you to show a little consideration, just once?”

Sten glowered at him. Alistair, his pauldrons scorched, face flecked with blood – some of it his own, stood his ground.

“It appears to me that I am the only one considering anything at all.”

“Rosemary and Wynne lived here, Sten! Is it too much to ask to not talk so- so casually about butchering the people they grew up with!”

“They are people no longer, if Saarebas could be called people in the first-“

“Mages are pretty clearly people Sten!-“

“Enough, both of you,” Rosemary said quietly, but with enough force to stop them both cold. She looked between the pair, then shook her head. “Now isn’t the time. Argue about it after the tower’s clear.”

The two of them exchanged a less-than-friendly glare, but fell silent.

“We’re close to the top of the tower now,” said Wynne. “If Uldred and Irving are to be found anywhere, it will be up there.”

Rosemary nodded, then took a deep breath. Just a few more doors between her and the ultimate fate of the rest of the tower.

A hand touched her shoulder. She looked around. Leliana, a brief nod, face serene.

“I’m with you,” she murmured.

Rosemary drew strength from that, steeling herself. Time to move on.

She got her crutch underneath herself and hopped towards the threshold, reaching out to push it open, bracing for another chamber filled with abominations and demons.

Instead what she saw was a magical cage, a shimmering wall of iridescent force, and the sight which lay within stole the breath from her lungs.

Battered, bloodied, armour tarnished, dented and spattered with gore. His blonde curls were a matted mess, slicked to the side of his head. Hands clasped together, he muttered phrases and snatches of words that may have been prayers.

“Cullen!”

The cry tore free from her, and Rosemary scrambled towards him, so hasty that the tip of her crutch skidded on the floor and she almost tripped.

His eyes, one so swollen that it could barely move, opened.

He let out a pained groan.

“Maker, not again,” he rasped. “Away from me, demon. I will not- I will not submit!”

“Cullen! Cullen, hold on – just, hold on, I’ll get you out of there!” Rosemary babbled, hands scrabbling at the hard surface of the magical force field.

“Why must you torment me?”

His voice was so piteously pleading that Rosemary actually stopped her desperate attempts to find purchase.

“Cullen? It’s me! It’s Rosemary!”

“No…” he moaned. “You will not break me with your illusions. You… you mean to tempt me with what cannot be so!”

“How long has the poor boy been in there?” Wynne wondered aloud.

“Some time,” Leliana answered grimly. “He has been tortured. I can tell.”

“It’s all right, Cullen, it’s not a trick – I’m here, I’m really here!” Rosemary grabbed for her staff, running it across the barrier, there had to be some way of breaking it down!

“I will not have you pawing through my memories demon!” he sobbed.

“I don’t think he is hearing you, Rose,” Leliana murmured.

Rosemary ignored her. This was her friend. If she couldn’t help him, then what good was she?

 “Cullen, listen. It’s Rosemary. Truly. I- I met you when we were both young, you had a message to deliver and didn’t know where to take it. You covered for me once when I was up after curfew, and I snuck you books from enchanter Sweeney’s private collection. When my crutch got broken, you risked the Knight-Commander’s anger by having it repaired.”

The templar’s bleary eyes fixed on her, full of pain and doubt. He wanted to believe, but the haunted cast to his expression spoke volumes. What abuses had he been subjected to?

“I… you…” she bit her lip. Well, this wasn’t the way she wanted this to come out to everyone, but Cullen meant more to her than a secret. “You… were the first person I ever told that I was gay. The only person.”

Someone behind her - she didn't know who, made a noise of surprise. Cullen stared, and then a change came over his face. “Rosemary? It's... it's really...?” he whispered.

She nodded frantically.

“Oh, Maker. I could scarcely believe…” Cullen’s shoulders slumped. “After what these mages have done, how they’ve tried to break me, what they did to the others…”

“It’s okay, it’s going to be all right,” said Rosemary, unable to stop the tears beginning to spill from her eyes. Relief and sorrow together. Her friend was alive, but he had suffered so much.

Cullen grimaced. “No. They are in the Harrowing chamber. Uldred and the others. While they yet live, everyone’s in danger.”

“Could there not be survivors?” Wynne asked. “We have seen no sign of Irving or a number of the senior enchanters.”

“If they’re alive, they’re either possessed or a blood mage,” Cullen croaked. “They must all be purged! The risk is too great for any other course.”

Those words were like a dagger to the gut. Cullen, her friend, advocating the slaughter of everyone left alive just on the _chance_ that they were corrupted.

“We can’t know that for certain, Cullen. I have to see for myself.”

The look of pure betrayal on Cullen’s face was far worse than any injury she’d suffered at the hands of darkspawn.

“Of course,” he muttered. “I should not have expected you to turn against your own kind, even for me.”

“I’m talking innocent lives here, Cullen!” Rosemary replied, heart breaking. “I’d do the same if it were anyone else, you have to understand!”

“I’m sure you would,” Cullen shook his head wearily. “Go on, then. I’m in no condition to stop you.”

“Cullen, I…” Rosemary’s head slumped and she, without meeting his eyes again, rose back to her foot, pushing off her crutch.

“Let’s go,” she whispered, hopping towards the stairs.

Maybe there would be something up there still worth saving.


	5. The Interlude: Campfires

Rosemary and Alistair had a lot in common, they discovered. Neither of them knew very much about their family, both of them were sent to a secluded location against their will when they were still young. They had both had their struggles with parts of themselves that weren’t their choice – he his bastard lineage, she her disability; he had been coddled, she had been underestimated. They had even both lost what became their second home, Rosemary the tower, Alistair the other Grey Wardens. They might once have been opposite sides of the mage/templar divide, but they were both Wardens now, and their experiences weren’t so different when viewed without the filter of prisoner and jailor.

And they got along. They made each other laugh. There was a kind of solidarity within what has happened to them, and over all this time spent together, they had bonded. It was Alistair who leapt first to her defence when the dwarves in Orzammar wrinkled their noses at her crutch, it was Alistair who backed her up when she announced that they needed to track down the Ashes to help Eamon.

“I’m glad we met, Alistair,” she told him once as they sat by the fire.

He quirked an eyebrow at her, then flashed that grin of his. “You’re not going to turn out to have been a dream all along, are you? That always happens in the books I read.”

“Couldn’t you have least dreamed me a little taller?” Rosemary answered with a smile.

“Taller? Perish the thought. How would I be able to use you as an armrest?”

Rosemary shoved him. “Glad to know that my happiness has to give way to your comfort. Your highly demeaning comfort, might I add!”

“What can I say? It’s my dream, I get to be selfish.”

They attempted to glare at each other, but neither of them could keep a straight face for more than a few seconds, and they dissolved into giggles.

“Maker,” she spluttered at length. “Here I am trying to be nice to you, and this is how you repay me?”

“If you don’t enjoy my company, milady, it raises the question of why you’re glad of it.”

Rosemary shoved him again and he toppled over backwards, laughing.

She smiled, but it was faintly wistful. She’d never had a friend that she could just tussle with before. The templars always stopped that kind of thing in the tower, and Cullen would have been hauled out on his ear if he was caught roughhousing with a mage. It was … nice, that was all. Made her feel more normal, and took some of that weight off her shoulders.

“I’m serious, though,” she said at length, after he calmed down. “You’re a good friend.”

Alistair took a few seconds to just look at her, then smiled with none of the same cockiness as before. “And you’re the bravest person I know,” a crafty look came into his eyes. “Even if you do snore like the Archdemon itself.”

“I do not!”

“Oh, really? Are you going to blame that one on the dog, too?”

Rosemary launched herself at Alistair and in moments they were rolling around on the ground again.

 

* * *

 

“The small elf has only one leg. Did it lose the other in a squishy flesh-related incident?”

Rosemary looked down to the missing limb and allowed her eyes to widen theatrically. “Maker’s breath!” she gasped. “It must have come unglued! Quick, Shale, see if you can find it!”

The golem paused. “It is making a joke,” Shale decided after a moment. “It has always been on a crutch since I met it.”

Rose favoured the golem with a wink. “I see there’s no getting anything past you.”

“Hmph,” Shale rumbled. “Were it a golem, it would not be at risk of losing its fragile appendages.”

“I never had the leg in the first place, Shale.”

The golem looked as surprised as a walking pile of rocks could. “It… always had one leg?”

“Long as I can remember.”

Shale was quiet for a long time, and Rosemary began to think that the golem had merely trailed off and was done talking, as was its habit. They spoke fairly often, but Shale often ran out of patience for her questions, and she had to come back another time. It was a shame, because Rosemary was constantly thinking of new things to ask. Shale was a _golem_ , an amazing magical construct that even the mages of the Circle had little to no knowledge about. There were all kinds of things Rosemary wanted to pick its stony brain about. For Shale’s part… well, it seemed to tolerate Rose, more or less. It certainly seemed to be more inclined to talk to her than it did certain other members of the group. Rose wasn’t sure if she could call their relationship a friendship, but she was trying.

“I had assumed the small elf had merely been careless with its squishy body; it is, after all, very reckless,” there was the suggestion of a glare on Shale’s craggy face as it spoke at last, and Rose grinned sheepishly, knowing that it was referring to the time she’d asked Shale to throw her into enemy lines.

It had seemed like a good idea! And it had mostly worked, even!

Rosemary shrugged. “Nope. This is just me. Everyone’s favourite hopping Grey Warden,”

Another pause. “Many of you squishy sorts complain constantly. The other Warden does. Wilhelm did. Incessantly,” Shale still couldn’t say the name of its former master without a note of utter hatred entering its voice. “I have never seen the small elf whine, and it has a disadvantage. I am… impressed.”

“Why, Shale, that was almost affectionate.”

“Was it? That will not do. I must find some heads to crush before I go soft. Bah.”

 

* * *

 

Rosemary and Oghren were both extremely different and yet alike in a couple of peculiar ways.

An elven mage who had barely known her family, only just into adulthood.

A dwarf warrior on the far side of a failed marriage, once honoured.

A young woman who had left her gilded cage to find nothing but conflict awaiting on the far side, shouldering a heavy burden.

An older man who had found none of the glory in a life governed solely by battle, taking a thankless task and having it cast back in his face.

Their personalities didn’t mesh, but Oghren understood, in his moments of sober insight. He knew some of what she was going through.

“You ain’t bad, Warden. You ain’t bad,” he slurred, as Rose packed up her bedroll to prepare to move on.

She refrained from commenting that he was drunk before noon. Oghren was in a perpetual state of at least slightly drunk. “You don’t have to call me Warden, you know. Alistair’s a Warden, too.”

“Eh. Sorry. Habit. In Orzammar if you don’t comment on whose grandfather washed whose grandfather’s britches, they challenge you to a sodding Proving.”

“My parents live in an alienage in Denerim. I think you’re safe from the wrath of my ancestors.”

Oghren peered at her. “An alienage?”

Rosemary hesitated. She didn’t quite follow the dwarven caste system, but she’d known that she hadn’t liked it. Birth determining one’s rank and station? That hit far, far too close to home. “It’s… it’s a little like your Dust Town. In the human cities, the elves are- they aren’t quite casteless but…”

His jaw worked for a moment. “Second class?”

“Yeah. Something like that. I left when I was a kid, though. Magic, and such.”

“Hrm,” Oghren looked thoughtful for a moment, and then unleashed a mighty belch. “Well, even more reason you ain’t bad,” he said, seemingly unperturbed. “Some folks would have a real chip on their shoulder.”

“Aw. You’re making my chip feel inadequate.”

Oghren chuckled. “Some of those nugknockers in Orzammar got a whole slab of granite. You? You barely got some gravel.”

Rosemary pouted, then gave a smile. “Well, I wouldn’t be anywhere without my trusty dwarf.”

“Yeah, yeah. Let’s finish packing,” Oghren turned away, but Rosemary could see him hiding a smile of his own behind his beard.

He wasn’t too bad himself.

 

* * *

 

“Do you ever wonder what it would have been like, Wynne?”

The older mage, stretching out tired legs, gave Rose a look of inquiry. “If what, my dear?”

Rosemary paused, bit her lip, and looked down. “I mean, if we didn’t have magic.”

“I do not think there’s any doubt that our lives would have been very different,” Wynne regarded her. “What brought this on?”

“I was just… well, I was thinking about the Circle. What happened there. Redcliffe, and Connor. I don’t want that to be me. I just wonder how it would be to… to not worry about all that. To not have to worry about demons and templars.”

“Everyone has their worries, Rosemary. At times, our own problems may seem insurmountable, but we see little of the struggles that others face.”

“Well, of course,” Rosemary twisted her hands together, laying her fingers one over the other. “But most people aren’t vulnerable to being possessed, and they don’t get stuck in towers away from everyone else.”

“Allow me to ask you something. Where are you from?”

“I don’t remember a lot, but Denerim, why?”

Wynne ignored the question. “I presume the alienage?”

“I’m an elf so… yes.”

“And had you not displayed your magic, would you have been able to leave?”

“I…” Rose hesitated. “I don’t know.”

“The Circle is not kind, but it is safe. It gave you a place to learn, and it allowed you to become what you are today; a Grey Warden, fighting to defeat the Blight. You have your worries, but they have made you stronger.”

Rosemary was quiet. She didn’t think about this topic often, and it had caused her to overlook something quite fundamental. What would she be, really, without her magic? Just another elf in an alienage, barely scraping by with her disability?

And her internal response to that thought was a roiling lash of astonishing anger.

Because yes, her experiences had tempered her, and yes, magic had affected her life from a young age, but she refused to believe that without it, she wouldn’t have still been worth something. Rose had been overcoming her whole life. She could have done that with or without the ability to cast spells.

Rose straightened up. “I would have found a way to make something of it.”

“Another person that I did not know as I know you, I may have chalked that up to bravado,” Wynne replied quietly. “Perhaps it still is.”

“My magic doesn’t define me.”

Wynne smiled gently. “Then you may have answered your own question, if you are still wondering how your life would have been without.”

Rosemary paused, and then laughed, because Wynne had talked her into a loop. A wise woman, one she wished she’d known better before the Blight.

“Thanks for putting up with me, Wynne.”

 

* * *

 

“I knew a man with one leg in Antiva.”

Zevran’s voice, as always, carried a tone of light amusement. Rosemary paused in scrubbing down the sturdy leather armour she’d taken to wearing for battle, and quirked an eyebrow at him.

“He was always complaining about everything. The weather, his wife, the beggars… If anyone had put a contract on his life, there would have been chaos amongst the Crows as we fought for the right to be the one to kill the miserable bastard.”

Rosemary arched her eyebrow a little higher. “And… you’re calling me miserable?”

Zevran snickered. “Oh no no, far from it. Merely I was reflecting that two people suffering from the same impairment could be wholly different.”

“It’s a missing leg, Zevran. I know your brains might live in a particular body part, but generally it doesn’t work that way for limbs.”

“Oh – you wound me madam! Such cruelty to poor Zevran!”

“For an assassin, you have pretty thin skin.”

“We assassins happen to be very sensitive people!”

“See, I don’t know many assassins, so I have to take your word for it.”

Zevran waggled his eyebrows. “You could certainly test my sensitivity for yourself.”

Rosemary couldn’t help but laugh at that. The Antivan had taken every opportunity to flirt with a good half of the other members of the party, was utterly incorrigible at times.

“You’re not my type, Zevran,” she told him, as she always did.

“You know… you’ve never actually told me your type. I find myself curious.”

Rosemary looked at him, shook her head, smiling. She supposed he could know. It’d become a relatively open secret around camp, since the Circle. “Usually they go by ‘she’, Zev.”

His eyes lit up. “Aha-ha!” he chuckled. “That would certainly explain a few things. Such as they way your gaze lingers on our red-heade-“

“That’s enough for now! Good talk!”

Rosemary blushed furiously as she bent back over the armour, Zevran’s laughter ringing out around the camp.

 

* * *

 

“You are very strange to me.”

One thing that wasn’t strange was Sten’s habit of throwing out statements apropos of seemingly nothing. Rosemary had become used to it.

“I’m strange to a lot of people.”

Sten frowned. “You are _saarebas_ , and yet you heal others. Your _antaam_ is not whole, and yet you are heedless of it. You say that you are not _aqun-athlok_ , but instead a woman who fights. And where you lead, others follow.”

“I’m not sure if I should take all of that as a compliment or an insult, Sten.”

“You should take it as neither. You are a contradiction.”

“And you’re a soldier without a unit, a warrior without a sword, and a scout that can’t send back his report. So who is the contradiction, here?”

The qunari glared at her, yet after a few seconds his expression… softened was not quite the right word. It changed into something a little more thoughtful. “You are also firm in your convictions. That is… unexpected.”

“I’m a Grey Warden and a mage, Sten. If I wasn’t firm, I wouldn’t get very far.”

He folded his arms and regarded her, having to tilt his head some ways downward to do so. If there was anyone else in the camp that made Rosemary feel short, it was Sten. He was a giant, could probably lift her in one hand – and had done on one occasion, slinging her over his shoulder as they retreated from a darkspawn ambush to find better ground.

“That remains to be seen.”

Rosemary frowned. “Are you saying we haven’t got far? We have allies now, we’re pulling something together. We might even have a lead on where your sword ended up.”

“Your objective is to end the Blight. While that objective goes unfulfilled, you have gone nowhere.”

“No,” Rose shook her head. “The path matters. If the Blight had ended at Ostagar, I would have done almost nothing as a Warden. A few months ago, this group consisted of three people and a dog. Will everything we’ve done matter if we fail? Maybe it won’t, but there’s a difference between trying and failing and just giving up. This is a war, Sten. I would have thought that a soldier would understand that to win a war, you need an army.”

“It is as you say, but we are yet to win any war.”

“When we do, I guess you’ll have your answer for the Arishok.”

“I do not know whether you are overconfident or dangerously optimistic.”

Rosemary leaned up, having to strain somewhat to come close to reaching, and patted Sten on the shoulder. “If I didn’t _believe_ that we’ll come out on top, then I would have lost already _._ Just like if I didn’t believe we could find your sword, there wouldn’t be any point in searching.”

Sten said nothing for a few seconds, then stepped back. “ _Pashaara_. I must stand watch, and you must get some sleep.”

Rose smiled. “Goodnight, Sten.”

 

* * *

 

Rosemary named the dog Garahel, one of the only stories Rose remembered hearing from when she was a child. It seemed appropriate, even if Alistair and Leliana insisted on calling him ‘Garra’.

While a wardog wasn’t quite a pet, the idea of owning an animal was very odd to her. Rose was so used to her possessions being limited to a small bedbox in a communal dormitory – or else what little she could carry in her pack as they moved along the road. Her crutch, her clothes, her staff.

Garra was her own little responsibility, even though half the time it seemed he took care of her more than she took care of him. He watched out for her in battle, he slept at her side in camp (when she could tolerate the smell), and he always seemed to know when she was down and could use a well-placed slobbery lick. …Well- _meaning_ slobbery lick.

Anyway. It was nice, sometimes, to just have something to turn to who wouldn’t ask questions or make inquiries, just let her hug him, bury her face in the back of his neck, and sit there.

A lot of people, in her opinion, would be a lot happier with a Mabari at their heel.

 

* * *

 

Rosemary wasn’t very good at talking to Leliana at camp.

She tried. She really did. It was just that whenever she made an attempt, she wound up getting sidetracked into something that was a lot more inane than purposeful.

She had, over the weeks and months, told Leliana at length about her opinions on robes, some of the enchanters in the Circle, and one or two of her stranger theories about exactly where darkspawn came from.

Leliana bore it all with a smile and a nod, which somehow made it even worse, because Rose knew that she was rambling, and it meant that Leliana was _putting up with her_.

It was just difficult. Rose ended up tongue tied unless she was focusing on a plan of action, and out in the field was hardly the time to make small talk.

The other woman was… she was smart, and she was beautiful, and she knew interesting stories, and she had just the right amount of good humour not to seem completely unattainable.

Except Rose just… wasn’t very good at articulating herself. That was one thing she’d learned, since leaving the tower; when there was an attractive woman around, Rosemary foundered.

There had been a couple of crushes back in the tower, but it had never been anything _serious_. Those surroundings had kind of prohibited it, even though there were plenty enough mages that did indulge their feelings. Enthusiastically, at that.

It was a little tough to ask another apprentice if feelings were shared, though, and Rose had never worked up the courage to do so.

The nerves, however, didn’t stop Rose’s heart from leaping when Leliana, in a fit of giggles, reached out and squeezed her hand.

She opened her mouth, about to say something and… and shut it again.

“You’re a good friend, Rose,” Leliana told her.

Right... a friend.

 

* * *

 

“I have a wonder of sorts, Rosemary.”

“What’s eating you, Morrigan?”

The apostate mage seated a few feet away studied Rose intently for several long seconds.

“Our lessons in shapeshifting have been underway for some time now, and I find myself curious; does your desire to assume other forms stem from an… insecurity, perchance?”

Rosemary blinked, looked away. She’d told herself that her interest in Morrigan’s form of magic was scholarly, that it was her first exposure to how magic might be taught outside of the tower, and as such, it would be great to learn more. And admittedly, it _was_ fascinating. Morrigan had none of the same techniques that Rosemary did, but simultaneously, Rose knew very little of the methods that the ‘witch of the wilds’ used. Morrigan wouldn’t admit it, but Rosemary suspected that they’d both taught one another a few tricks.

She’d told herself it was scholarly, but now and then, the doubts had crept in. Was it purely due to wanting to know more, or was there something else to it? Was it something to do with, well, with…

Rose’s eyes dropped down to the sectioned-off leg of her breeches, the tiny parcel within which lay the nub where her right leg would have been.

“I don’t know,” she said quietly. “I’ve never encountered something like this before,” the thoughts curled their way around her head, insinuating themselves into little corners in the back of her mind, breeding doubts and worries. It had always been other people that had attempted to make her disability into something to be ashamed of or looked down upon, tell her that she was somehow less capable or worth less. But to take another form… Another _whole_ form…

“And it causes you to think of what may be.”

Rosemary looked at Morrigan sharply. “That’s not it. I’m not… it isn’t something that needs fixing.”

“Twas not my intention to name it such. If you were so concerned for your body, twould have been a simple matter to indulge in blood magic.”

“…Yeah,” Rosemary had thought often of that nightmare in the Fade, of what the demons had offered her. They had been so certain that Rose wanted only to be free from her handicap that it had been a central part of the illusion, and it had shaken her. They’d known enough to present her a vision of the parents she barely remembered. Was there some kind of subconscious desire to be ‘fixed’?

“You should not worry. Tis only natural to wish to experience the world in different ways.”

“I… right. Thanks, Morrigan.”

The witch gave Rosemary a slightly awkward smile, reminding her that these types of conversations were not precisely the apostate’s forte.

“Well, we shall best be on with it before we crumble to dust, yes? There’s something I wish to show you.”

“All right,” Rosemary got her crutch underneath herself, started to push up off the ground, and then paused as Morrigan offered her hand. Taking it with some gratitude, Rose was lifted up onto her feet, getting her balance easily. Without another word, Morrigan turned away and began walking towards the edge of camp. Rose followed along in her wake, hopping easily across the ground. Thank the Maker they avoided marshy terrain for the most part, it restricted her mobility.

It was perhaps ten minutes later that Morrigan drew to a halt in a clearing. Though it was late, bright moonlight gave sufficient illumination to see, albeit a little indistinctly. Were it not for the risks of giving away their position, Rose would have considered producing a magelight. There could be darkspawn in these woods.

“You have difficulties with this, I know.”

Well, that was true enough. Trying to learn to shapeshift had been an exercise in absolute frustration. Each time, just when it felt like she might finally be about to grasp it, Rosemary was struck by the mental equivalent of a muscular twitch, reminding her of her very much humanoid body, of what she currently possessed. It was like an anchor being hurled overboard a ship, sending her plunging to the depths of rigid, locked in form.

Rose nodded.

“You are not betraying yourself to seek this knowledge.”

Rosemary frowned, faltered. “I… what do you mean?”

“Is it not true? You fear that you are seeking a cure for an ailment. You yourself admitted as much.”

She looked down to her crutch.

Morrigan pressed on. “Tis not a betrayal. Tis an opportunity. Free your mind from that concern, and focus only on your magic.”

Suppressing a sigh, because Morrigan was trying to help, Rosemary took a breath and attempted to clear her head of any extraneous thoughts. She needed to fixate purely on the instructions that Morrigan had given her in the past – calling it theory would probably be a bit of a stretch, it was more the other mage just saying ‘do this’ or ‘do that’. She would not have made a good teacher in the Circle, but this wasn’t Kinloch Hold.

Inhale, exhale.

Inhale, exhale.

Focus on the other form. Focus on her mana and its flow, feeling it rippling beneath the surface of her flesh.

A nudge here, a prod there.

And now malleable.

Rose held the shape in her head, what Morrigan had told her – _‘you must study the animal first. You must know it intimately in order to become it.’_

A suggestion of an alteration, of changes- a thought twitched at the edge of her mind, and Rosemary grasped it, and then let it go.

She wasn’t fixing anything. She was learning something useful.

Another surge of her magic, pushing, pushing, and- it was as a dam giving way before the rushing waters.

She _changed._

In a trice she was down on… on all fours?

A long muzzle peered down ahead of her, a plethora of scents striking her nostrils.

Tentatively, she raised a… not a hand, a paw. Put it down again. Raise the other. Down again.

She could feel two more behind her, a long, swishing tail.

She was a wolf.

Rosemary looked up, saw Morrigan regarding her with what was – surely a trick of the light – a _smile_.

Her lupine body trembling, Rosemary moved forward and for the first time in her life, walked. On four legs, yes, but she was putting one paw in front of the other and _walking_.

Rosemary didn’t remember changing back, but she did remember the way her vision blurred with happy tears as her face became her own again.


	6. The Fifth Occasion: Landsmeet

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: some more blood.

“Are you ready for this?”

“Walking into Denerim to meet Loghain face to face, trusting that an elf and a bastard can politically outmanoeuvre a war hero? Is this a serious question?”

“Why, Rose, you almost sound like you don’t trust Eamon’s plan!”

“Alistair, the most vicious debate I’ve had involved three mages at each other’s throats over who took the last scone. I’m out of my depth-“

“Eamon’s putting me forward as the next king, for Andraste’s sake! Do you think that I’m not?”

Rosemary winced. Alistair had a point.

“Sorry. I shouldn’t complain.”

Alistair sighed. “And I shouldn’t shout at you. Eamon’s plan has me on edge. I don’t know if I can do this.”

Rosemary opened her arms, and after a moment, her friend hugged her tightly.

Their party – the entire household staff of Arl Eamon and more than a few knights – were waiting outside the city gates of the capital. They were held up while ‘we seek out the Teryn’, which was code for Loghain making them wait just long enough to start sweating.

It was working. Rosemary hadn’t been this anxious since her Harrowing.

They broke the embrace and exchanged nods. Everything was riding on this. Lose the Landsmeet to Loghain and their attempts to rally Ferelden were dead in the water, the Blight would swallow the country whole. Even so, they’d come a long way, one hell of a long way. As long as they treated this as just another obstacle on the road to defeating the Blight, slaying the Archdemon, well…

After all the other hurdles they’d leapt, how could they let themselves fail at the final step?

Ahead of them, Arl Eamon shifted in the saddle as the gates of Denerim finally swung open to admit the party. Now they were truly marching into the lion’s mouth; Rosemary could only pray that the Arl was correct, and that even Loghain wouldn’t dare to move openly against them in the capital. The Bannorn supposedly held this Landsmeet in the highest regard, and Rose had to take Eamon’s word for it. Hadn’t been much call nor opportunity to delve into politics, locked up in that tower. It would be nice, at least, to experience Denerim without having to skulk in the shadows, worrying that being seen at the wrong place at the wrong time would bring down the wrath of the city guard down on their heads. Rosemary didn’t hold fond memories of the capital; had it not been absolutely necessary to track down Brother Genitivi, and hence visit his home, she wouldn’t have come within ten miles of the place.

Crutch under her arm and Alistair at her side, they moved forward.

Rosemary felt dozens of pairs of eyes watching them. Guards, common folk, soldiers, and she didn’t doubt more than a few spies mixed in. Maker, she sure wasn’t used to being the centre of attention. Even Orzammar’s Assembly had nothing on this.

Loghain met them in Denerim’s palace, flanked by a grey-haired , sallow-faced man that, if Eamon’s information was correct, was Arl Howe, one of Loghain’s strongest supporters.

Rosemary met them alongside Eamon and Alistair. The clicking of her crutch against the polished stone floor was utterly deafening.

Loghain appraised them with the same penetrating stare Rosemary remembered from Ostagar. His eyes lingered on her for a long moment.

“So, Eamon, here we are at last.”

“Here we are,” Eamon agreed.

“I must admit, I thought better of you than to make such a transparent grab for power with the country in a state of unrest. You can’t possibly think that the claim of some bastard is stronger than that of my daughter.”

“And I thought better of you than a regicide and a murderer, Loghain. Alistair is the rightful heir to the throne.”

“Watch your tone around the regent, Eamon,” Howe interjected with a scowl. “He’s been the only thing holding this country together, no thanks to this political… stunt of yours. I won’t brook these unfounded accusations.”

“Unfounded?” Alistair’s voice was hard with anger. “We were at Ostagar! We know exactly what Loghain did!”

“How convenient that Maric’s alleged bastard is also the only man who can provide testimony to the regent’s so-called crimes,” Howe’s every word dripped with scorn, and after a moment he turned his attention to Rose. “Oh, forgive my mistake; you also appear to have dragged a knife-eared cripple off the street to support your claim. Hoping to earn the Landsmeet’s pity vote, Eamon?”

Rosemary’s hand clenched around her crutch, white-knuckled. “I’ve spent much of the last year dealing with darkspawn and multiple attempts on my life, Arl Howe. I haven’t had much time to hang around on the street,” she put everything she had into keeping her voice steady, into not allowing any tremor of anger.

“Evidently you can’t have done much of a job of that, if it’s cost you your leg,” Howe sneered.

“Evidently your assassins can’t have done much of a job, if they couldn’t kill a _cripple_.”

“Enough of this,” Loghain barked. “You’ve made a fine showing, Eamon, but you can’t hope to win over the Landsmeet. End this foolishness now, and we can bring the Bannorn to heel.”

“I think not, Teryn Loghain. Alistair? Rosemary? I believe it’s time for us to go.”

With the barest hint of a bow, Eamon turned and left. Alistair glared daggers at Loghain and then followed. Rosemary went last, feeling Arl Howe’s eyes boring into her back.

If she hadn’t had motive enough already, seeing the smug look scrubbed from that man’s face would make this entire political mess worthwhile.

 

* * *

 

The next few days were spent investigating and doing legwork, trying to gauge the mood of Denerim, see what could be done to win over the various nobles that had arrived for the Landsmeet. For Rose it was all she could do just to keep track of it; there was certainly a place for scheming in the Circle, but she’d been too young to be involved the majority of the time. In truth, if it wasn’t for Eamon, they would have sunk without a trace. Few members of Rosemary’s group were much for diplomacy, and even Leliana’s experience mostly concerned Orlais. Fereldan nobles had little in common. 

Nevertheless, they steadily accumulated information and points of interest. Few of the Banns were happy with Loghain’s policy of demanding their loyalty with darkspawn besieging their lands. Howe had a number of mercenary groups in his pocket. There was little credibility in claiming Loghain’s betrayal at Ostagar. Alistair’s claim was viewed just as tenuously as the Teryn had implied. Slowly, a plan of action for the Landsmeet itself was coalescing. However, the arguments Rosemary were formulating alongside Eamon and Leliana lacked a little for strength; they needed either stronger leverage with the Banns and Arls, or to turn up more compelling evidence for Loghain’s crimes. Preferably both.

They had some promising leads to that end. Queen Anora herself had sent a message to the estate, asking for help. There was also considerable unrest in the alienage; apparently some kind of quarantine had been enforced. Unfortunately, while Rose wanted to see what the queen had to say for herself, breaking her out of captivity was a little beyond her capabilities. Sneaking into Arl Howe’s household was all well and good. It made sense, it was doable, they had a route in, and inside information. It just… wasn’t for Rose. She wasn’t good at sneaking. She also wasn’t very good at disguise. A little difficult to pretend to be anything much when she had a very distinctive lack of height and lack of, well, limb. Pretending to be a guard was out of the question.

As such, Rosemary was going to have to sit that one out. She’d just have to trust that Alistair could handle it, along with Leliana, Morrigan and Zevran. Rose almost wished she could be there just to see Alistair trying to coexist with their apostate comrade. Mature? No. Entertaining? Maker, yes.

Even so, Rose needed to trust them. It was that or send Oghren, and Rose had precisely zero faith in his ability to infiltrate anything other than a tavern. In the meantime, there was the alienage to investigate, the prospect of which caused a fluttering in the centre of her chest. It had been such a long time, and the memories were so blurred and vague. The place where she was born, the place where her magic was discovered. The place where her family perhaps still lived.

Nerves didn’t even begin to cover it.

Wynne, Sten, and Garahel accompanied Rosemary to the gates of the alienage, the dog trotting obediently along at her side. Oghren and Shale were running backup for the others, a team waiting in place to help them out if they got into a tight spot. Maker willing, they wouldn’t be needed. If the situation got bad enough that a drunken dwarf and a runaway golem would _improve_ it…

The guard on the gate eyed them, but said nothing, standing aside to allow the group through. Rose steeled herself, and then took her first step inside the alienage for over ten years.

The surroundings were… strange. Just familiar enough to be disconcerting without any specific details to draw upon. Rosemary had a vague sense of recognising the shape of the streets, and perhaps there was a ghost of the memory of the bridge that spanned the path from the city proper into the alienage. Her recollections were less than sharp, dulled by years away, years in the Circle tower, the fact that the last time she’d stood here, she’d been even smaller than she was now.

It was surreal. It almost felt like being in the Fade, where the harder you looked at something, the more distorted and indistinct it became. She’d been so excited when the templars had come for her, had thought that it would be a grand adventure, outside of the alienage for the first time! Rosemary hadn’t understood until much later that her departure from Denerim wasn’t going to be temporary. Her parents had spared her that, had treated it like a holiday, hadn’t given indication that it was quite possible that she’d never see them again. Rosemary wasn’t sure whether to be grateful or resentful for that. Maybe a little of both. Though it would have been hard for her to understand at eight, she wished now that she’d had a chance to say goodbye. She’d spent a few months thinking that her parents just didn’t care anymore before someone had bothered telling her that no, this was just how the Circle worked.

Elves stood by on the sides of the street, a handful here, a handful there, engaged in low conversations. As Rosemary and the others began to move on through, Rose heard the talking dwindle, and then cease. They were being watched. She couldn’t imagine that the sight of a robed human, a towering qunari and a mabari was a particularly common one in the alienage. It took effort for Rose to be the least conspicuous member of the group.

A few minutes of walking, and then Rose stopped dead in her tracks.

Because the vhenadahl? That, she did recognise.

It wasn’t the memory of that trick from the Fade, it was real, solid, and for a moment, Rosemary’s breath was stolen away.

The tree looked just like she remembered it.

Not until a few seconds later did Rosemary notice the commotion going on behind the tree. A crowd had gathered around one of the buildings, voices raised in protest. From here, she couldn’t make out the object of the mob’s displeasure.

Rose glanced to the side. “Sten, can you see what’s going on?”

The qunari strained his neck, and then his expression darkened. “Humans are keeping back the crowd. I recognise the _bas_ ; they are of Tevinter.”

“Tevinter? Here?” that couldn’t be right. The Imperium was held up as a cautionary tale of the risks and evils of magic, in the Circle. Tevene Magisters were said to be the worst of abusers of the gift. Was in Andraste’s name were they doing in Denerim?

“The style of their uniform is familiar to me. If they are not Tevene, they are doing a convincing job of resembling them,” the qunari’s scowl hadn’t left his face. Right… his people were at war with Tevinter.

“We need to get a closer look. Keep your eyes peeled.”

Knowing implicitly that the others would follow, Rosemary got back into motion, beginning to sidle and slide her way through the crowd as she approached the building being corralled. There was a palpable aura of discontent surrounding the elves, and it was with a pang that Rose realised that this was the largest collection of her own people she’d seen since the Dalish clan in the Brecilian forest. Although there was the occasional raised voice, a call of ‘I haven’t seen my sister in days!’ or ‘You can’t keep us out forever!’, the mood seemed to be more sullen than violent.

Sten was a useful means of negotiating through the throng; Rose just had to hop along in his wake and they made plenty of headway. Soon enough, they were at the front of the crowd, where a red-headed woman was squaring off against an impassive human, wearing livery that Rosemary didn’t recognise. Tevene, she supposed.

“Why isn’t anyone coming back out, if you’re helping them?” the accusation was heavy in the elf’s voice.

“You seem to be forgetting the definition of ‘quarantine’. We’re keeping the sick back to make sure they don’t make anyone else ill. It’s just a precaution!”

“My uncle Cirion has been gone for over two weeks! Elder Valendrian wasn’t even sick, and you took him in there, too!”

The Tevene opened his mouth to shoot back a retort, and then his jaw merely hung open as he caught sight of Sten. The armed men behind him looked visibly unsettled.

“A qunari? I’m ah- we don’t want any trouble, here.”

“Unfortunate. It appears you have trouble already.”

Rosemary stepped past Sten, garnering an immediate double-take.

“What’s all this about?” she asked, levelly meeting the Tevene’s eyes.

“There’s been… sickness in the alienage. Our healers have graciously been offering their services to the impoverished in their time of need.”

“Tevinter charity? Next they will tell us of their miraculous flying ships that can span oceans in hours,” rumbled Sten.

“Doubt us if you like, qunari, but if it wasn’t for our charity, the streets would be piled with elven dead.”

“Up until the sick stopped coming back!” the elven woman broke in again. “Up until people started going missing that weren’t ill!”

The soldier sighed wearily, as if he’d heard this many times already. “Look, my job starts and ends with keeping the clinic safe. I don’t make the rules! That’s for the healers, and they say quarantine. Now is there anything else, or are you going to keep shouting until I go deaf?”

The elf scowled and backed away, the crowd slowly beginning to disperse around them, even if the dark mutterings continued from the passers-by. The mood was grim, tense. Though it hadn’t boiled over yet, the storm clouds were beginning to gather.

Making a motion with her hand for the others to follow, Rosemary trailed along after the redheaded elf. If she’d been vocal enough to protest directly to soldiers, she was the most promising lead as to just what was going on here.

“Hey, do you have a moment?”

“I really don’t-“ the woman turned and immediately hesitated. “All right, actually maybe I do. Pretty strange to see an elf with a mabari and a… whatever he is. Who are you?”

“I used to live here when I was little,” Rose replied. “I’m Rosemary. Surana?”

“Shianni,” the taller elf squinted at Rosemary for a second. “Look, I’m really not sure what you’re doing here, but this isn’t a good time for the alienage.”

“I’m here to help,” Rose answered immediately.

Shianni gave Rosemary an appraising look, and then her expression changed. “If you weren’t an elf, I don’t know if I’d believe you. Right now, though, we have our backs against the wall. Those humans are up to something, and nobody cares enough to try to get involved.”

“Humans keeping elves conveniently locked up? Yeah, I’d say that sounds pretty damn shady,” Rosemary closed her eyes a moment, swallowing back a grimace. Maker’s balls. This hadn’t been what she’d wanted to find upon coming home, insomuch as she’d spent most of her childhood here.

“I agree,” added Wynne. “I’m uncertain I trust the motives of these Tevinter healers to be altruistic.”

Shianni eyed Wynne dubiously, and then nodded. “If you want to help us, then there’s someone you should see.”

“I do. If you get them, we’ll wait.”

Shianni shook her head. “No, it’s better if you come with me. Not a good idea to have this type of talk on the street. This way.”

Rosemary glanced to the others, shrugged, then followed. Of all the people to set up an ambush, Rose didn’t think that this elf would be one of them. Even if there was a dozen knifemen working around the corner, they’d fought off far worse, and they had two mages here, besides.

The taller woman walked quickly, forcing Rose to break into something of a canter to keep up. She’d had a lot of chance to practice moving at pace since beginning life on the road, and Rose barely had to think about maintaining her balance now. Rosemary had never considered herself to have a sedentary lifestyle in the Circle, but the difference in her levels of fitness was quite remarkable. She wasn’t short and scrawny any longer. More like wiry, even athletic, insomuch as that was possible.

Shianni stopped outside of an unassuming, rundown home, knocked three times on the door.

“It’s me,” she called softly. “I brought some friends. Don’t get twitchy.”

There was a pause, and then the door opened inward. Rosemary caught the briefest flash of red hair, and then whoever was indoors was out of sight.

The elf looked back to them, hesitated, and then tipped her head towards the house. “Might be a little cramped, but come on in.”

Rosemary nodded, and then entered after Shianni. Internally, almost as an unconscious instinct, Rose touched her focus to the well of magical power within. Just a precaution, just in case she’d got the wrong measure of this woman.

No ambush was forthcoming. There was, however, another elven woman, a dagger in each hand, wearing a battered set of leather armour, or something like leather, at least. Her red hair matched Shianni’s, but her skin was several shades darker, reminding Rose a little of Zevran’s tone. Her features were soft – smooth cheeks, light brow, a short button of a nose. Her expression was not; a scowl of unbridled hostility.

“Who the fuck is this, Shianni?”

“Easy, cousin. She wants to help us.”

The woman’s gaze swept Rosemary up and down, and her frown deepened. “I don’t exactly think she’s gonna be much for busting into that hospice. Good intentions are nice and all, but we need actual fucking commitment.”

“A war dog, an enchanter, and a qunari warrior,” Rosemary answered, a little tersely. “Andraste’s flaming ass, do you want anything else? Maybe a regiment?”

For a second, Shianni’s cousin looked infuriated… and then she broke out into laughter. “All right. Maybe you have something.”

Shianni rolled her eyes. “Forgive my cousin, she skipped learning how to talk like a normal person.  Lurala, this is Rosemary. Rosemary, Lurala.”

Rosemary introduced the others, noticing all the while that Lurala was right back to frowning.

Then, her eyes widened.

“Holy shit. Holy fucking shit. You’re kidding me. Rosemary. _Rose_. I used to fucking play with you when we were kids!”

Rosemary blinked, and her heart skipped a beat. “Lulu?” she managed, mouth dry.

Faint memories of a loud-mouthed child with an unruly mop of red hair, of constantly skinned knees and knuckles, of a friend who’d never seemed to even notice her disability.

Lurala was nodding, a stupefied smile across her face. “Never thought I’d see you again after the shems dragged you away. Maker, you look like such a fucking scrapper I didn’t even recognise you!”

Rose was reeling. In a good way. Sort of. “I… I wasn’t thinking about who I might meet here,” she admitted after a second. “I just heard there was trouble and wanted to see what I could do. Maker on a rutting boar, Lulu… I can’t believe it.”

Lurala snorted a laugh. “Hey look, Shianni, someone else for you to scold.”

“ _She’s_ not my cousin,” Shianni shot back. “And at least she’s creative. You just have a dirty mouth.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Lurala grumbled. “Not gonna lie, would have been nice to see you in better times, but things are pretty fucked up here. Please don’t tell me you’ve learned some kind of secret crutch-fighting technique.”

“They took me away because I have magic, Lulu. That’s- that’s where I’ve been for ten years. Learning magic.”

Lurala slapped a hand to her head. “Shit, right, that was it. You stopped a runaway cart right in its fucking tracks! Everyone was so freaked out, and then the templars came for you. Damn. You were locked up for all this time?”

“Not all,” Rose replied. “But the rest gets… complicated. Let’s get to the bottom of the Tevinters, and then I’ll tell you all about it, deal?”

“Fair enough. I reckon I’ve got a way into the back of their hospice. Was gonna go for it myself, actually; my dad’s missing.” Lurala hesitated, and her eyes dropped. “Look, though, there’s… there’s something you should know.”

Rosemary’s stomach dropped. That expression boded nothing good. “Yes?”

“Your folks… Shit. I’m sorry, Rose. They… they’re dead.”

It was if her crutch had been kicked out from underneath her. She physically swayed. “I…” she stopped, swallowed, started again. “H-how… how did it happen?”

Her hopes tasted bitter, crushed. It had been a slender belief, really, that she’d be able to track down her parents. The alienage was large and Rose’s memories were vague, and they had a hundred things to do in Denerim without worrying about finding her family. But… she’d held out just a little flicker of hope that maybe through luck or circumstance, she’d find them, let them know that their daughter had turned out okay, meet the people who’d been forced to give her up, who’d made her the crutch.

Not being able to find them was one thing. But… dead?

Shianni spoke up, a quiet murmur. “About a year ago, the Arl’s son crashed the alienage, abducted some women, took them… - _us_ to his estate.”

“And then Shianni’s brother came along with my groom and a couple others to break us out, and we killed the bastard.”

“Two of ours died, and poor Soris took the fall, but the guards weren’t satisfied. They tore through the alienage.”

Lurala nodded, sighed. “And your parents they- well, they were never the kind of people to take that lying down. They got organised, did what they could to help everyone, turned their home into a place where you could at least get something to eat and somewhere to spend the night. I pitched in too. It was my mess, after all. But… well, the guards… they saw it as too many elves in one place. Meant we had to… had to be plotting to get violent. They stormed their house and…” she looked away again.

Garahel whined mournfully, pressing up against Rose’s leg.

“I’m so sorry, my dear,” Wynne said from behind her.

Rosemary barely heard her. She felt numb. After all this time, after everything she’d gone through to come home, the closest, clearest memory of her parents she was ever going to get was the demons parodying them?

Her shoulders slumped. She’d dreamed of seeing them again, of showing them what she’d made of herself. She’d hoped that she could make them proud of the woman she’d grown into.

But this…

This was worse than not meeting them at all.

“Kadan,” Sten’s voice was uncharacteristically gentle. “Bring them honour by remembering our purpose here. If they aided your people, they would approve of their daughter doing the same.”

Maybe so.

Rosemary exhaled. The breath shuddered, and she wiped at her eyes fiercely. However hard it might be, she had to focus. People were depending on her, not just her comrades, but here in the alienage too, if Shianni’s suspicions were true.

“You gonna be all right?” asked Lurala. “Sorry to dump that on you. Didn’t want to leave it unsaid, in case I get fucked up, y’know?”

“I’ll manage,” Rose replied dully. “Thanks for telling me.”

At least she didn’t have to wonder any longer. It was something.

“I didn’t know them as well as Lulu did, but I’m sorry, for what it’s worth,” added Shianni.

“Yeah. Good fucking people,” Lurala managed to sound sombre while swearing. “Your big friend there is right, Rose, we can give ‘em something to smile about by kicking down those Vints’ door.”

Rosemary nodded slowly. If nothing else, she could take the grief out on the deserving.

“Okay. What’s the plan?”

 

* * *

 

At some point, as they fought their way through a ‘clinic’ that was bursting with Tevinter soldiers, Rosemary went from scowling to _snarling_.

She didn’t remember allowing her magic free, nor the tight feeling of control that she’d come to associate with focusing intently on her own body.

One moment she was assisting Wynne, pouring renewing, bolstering energy into the others. One moment she was urging Garahel forward, eyeing Lurala as she moved forward in a dizzying blur of steel that was eerily reminiscent of a more aggressive, less fluid Zevran.

The next, she had a man’s throat in her jaws, tearing, ripping, the scent of blood sparking into her acutely sensitive nostrils.

The Tevene went down under the weight of Rose’s lupine body, gore splattering her muzzle. Standing atop him, she threw back her head and howled.

Resistance didn’t hold out long, after that. Turned out even Tevinter fighters had little stomach to keep fighting when their ranks were being ripped apart by a pair of wild animals and a qunari.

Rose could smell fear, not just from the Tevene, but from the packed holding cages rammed against the side of the room. Shianni and Lurala had been right to suspect; the so-called healers had the elves imprisoned, and considering that country’s reputation, it wasn’t a great stretch to deduce where the missing had ended up.

Ahead, hands raised high in surrender, stood a mage. No, a _magister_.

Rosemary padded forward, a low growl in the back of her throat. The slaver looked down at her, and his throat bobbed as he swallowed. Good, let him be afraid.

She wrestled with her anger, even as she wanted little more than to lunge forward and rip the man to shreds. No. She was better than that. She needed _answers_.

Marshalling her willpower, Rose focused, and shifted back, sliding into her own shape. It was growing easier with practice, though she still hadn’t mastered any forms other than that of the wolf. Garahel obediently trotted up to her with her crutch in his mouth, and she gave him a little nod of thanks, levering it underneath herself to get back into a standing position.

She could feel the blood dripping down her face. She knew well enough how frightful she had to look.

“You’ve got about five seconds to start talking,” Rose warned the magister, voice like ice.

“Less than,” growled Lurala, looking across to the cages.

“Maker’s breath- that magic, I’ve never seen- I-I mean, y-yes! I’ll tell you everything you want to know!”

“You’re taking elves as slaves, aren’t you? How did you get this set up?”

“We’ve been working with the regent!” he stammered. “He gets coin, we get healthy cargo to ship off back home.”

“Cargo!? You sick bastard, these are our _people!_ ” Lurala roared.

“J-just a slip of the tongue!”

“Let it slip again, and I’m going to tear it out. Only warning,” Lurala looked as much a caged wolf as Rosemary had felt a moment ago.

“L-look, this doesn’t need to end violently! I have a proposal for you!”

Rosemary’s eyes narrowed. “Speak.”

“We quite obviously have no way of continuing our business here, so h-how about in exchange for the slaves, I give you every document I have implicating Loghain! Surely whatever quarrel you have with him is more important than my life!”

“Andraste’s burning ashes, do you seriously think I’m going to let you walk out of here with half the alienage?” Rosemary almost couldn’t believe the gall of the man, trying to _negotiate_ , as if he had any room to make demands.

“Well I –uh, I mean, I merely thought…” he trailed off, glanced down at Rosemary’s crutch. “All right, how about this; while I bow to your arcane prowess, I have knowledge of many Tevinter techniques that you would not study here in the south. If you allow me to use the, ahem, life force of the elves here, I could augment your physical health, even restore your lost limb. Surely a mage of your power must have contemplated doing so-“

The bolt of pure mana from Rosemary’s staff took the magister in the chest and sent him flying across the room, crashing into the far wall and sliding to the floor in a motionless heap.

“Beat me to it. What a piece of shit,” Lurala hurried over to the cages, began fiddling with the locking mechanisms.

Rosemary lowered her staff. Her shoulders trembled with pure anger.

Again. Always with the temptation, always treating her as if the disability was something that she absolutely had to do away with the moment she could.

But that was what her parents had taught her, wasn’t it? Her father had made her the first crutch, her mother had encouraged her. Neither of them had ever acted like Rose had anything to prove. Both had been supportive, both had assured her that she got around just as well as anyone else.

She couldn’t remember their faces, but she could remember their words.

That was worth holding close.


	7. The Exception: Leliana

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's that! 
> 
> Hope everyone who took a glance at this enjoyed it. This was originally supposed to be short and fluffy and became, well, uh... long and fluffy, I guess. But yes, thanks for reading, all.

“You know, I don’t think I ever told you how much I admire you.”

Startled, Rosemary looked along the log she was seated upon to Leliana, the pair warming themselves by the campfire. She struggled to keep a stupid smile from her face. Maker, she always went to goo the moment Leliana said anything nice to her.

“I’m just doing my best,” she replied, a touch bashfully.

“Well, you are very brave, and you always try to do what’s right instead of what’s easy.”

“A…haha…” Rosemary rubbed the back of her head, hand bumping her braid. “That’s what being a grey warden is about, right? Protecting people. What’s the point of trying to stop the Blight if we’re going to trample everyone in the way?”

Leliana smiled. “See, that’s what I mean! It would be simple to justify a great many things by reasoning that they were necessary to defeat darkspawn. I’m glad that you care so much.”

Rose’s tongue tripped over itself as she tried to think of a response. Anyone else, and a flippant quip would have sprung to mind by now. Leliana was… difficult, so intensely sincere that it never felt right or fair to deflect with humour. “I wouldn’t be able to do it without all of you supporting me.”

“And so modest, too. Are there no ends to your virtues?” Leliana said, teasing.

“I do blaspheme a lot.”

She giggled. “I like to think the Maker would be impressed by the range of curses you come up with.”

Rose fiddled with her hair again, just for any kind of distraction, something to focus on to take her attention from Leliana’s face, from idly wondering what it would be like to hold the other woman close, share an embrace, or… or more.

“Seriously though… thank you. It really means a lot to hear you say that,” and it did. Actually, it was incredibly flattering – Leliana was somebody that Rosemary looked up to in her own way. For multiple reasons.

Leliana beamed back at her and shifted a little closer along the log. Dusk was falling, and the camp was bustling. Alistair and Wynne had somehow roped Sten into helping them with the cooking, and the qunari had surprised both by taking the task with the utmost seriousness, commanding and instructing the two of them like it was a battlefield. Oghren was engaged in a lively ‘discussion’ with Morrigan, largely consisting of the witch telling the dwarf to go-away-right-this-instant-you-wretch. Zevran appeared to have orchestrated a staring contest between Shale and Garahel. The silver tongue on that man…

“I enjoy your company. I never expected to find someone else who agrees with me about the Maker.”

Rose smiled wistfully. “I’m a mage, an elf, and a cripple. It’s nice to think that the Maker cares, even if elves aren’t in the Chant.”

There was a flicker of disquiet across Leliana’s face. “You shouldn’t call yourself that. I know others have, but they’re trying to diminish you.”

Rose shrugged. “If I take it as my own, then they can’t use it to hurt me.”

Leliana frowned. “You are much more than your crutch.”

“Never said I wasn’t. It just dulls the blade to acknowledge the handicap, you know? Lets me say ‘yeah, and?’ to anyone that wants to try and put me down. Or, you know, that they can go find the nearest darkspawn, pull down their trousers and-“

“ _Rosemary!_ You are awful!”

Rosemary broke off, laughing and shaking her head. “I wasn’t actually going to say it!”

“The fact that you thought it was bad enough!”

The elf continued giggling, hand once more going up to her head to toy with her braid. She should really let it down. Not good to keep it all tied up overnight.

She was just beginning to unthread the interwoven strands when, all of a sudden, Rose felt another pair of hands settle into her hair.

She froze.

“May I?” Leliana murmured softly.

“I… I… s-sure,” Rosemary managed.

Humming a tune softly under her breath, Leliana began to unlace the braid, steady, confident motions that gradually teased the hair apart.

Rosemary’s whole scalp was tingling, little electrical charges of excitement that it was all she could do to suppress. This didn’t mean anything, she told herself, Leliana was just being affectionately friendly. This was just the type of thing that friends did, right? Play with one another’s hair?

R-right.

Soon enough, Rose’s straight black locks were falling about her shoulders, loose and freed. She gave a quiet sigh, glad to have it untied… and immediately finding herself longing for Leliana’s touch to resume as the bard withdrew her hands, flashing a smile.

“That… wasn’t too familiar of me, was it?” Leliana asked, tentative. “You have very lovely hair, and I’ve ah… I’ve always wanted to…” she trailed off, laugh. “That sounds a bit strange, doesn’t it?”

“It wasn’t too familiar, and it isn’t strange,” Rose answered shyly, not quite able to meet Leliana’s eye. Butterflies were fluttering in her chest.

Leliana chuckled musically. “That is good to know.”

The bard’s hand settled on Rosemary’s as they sat there, watching the ongoing war that had become of the night’s cooking arrangements. She didn’t pull away.

 

* * *

 

The ogre hit Rosemary so hard that she parted company with the ground, crashing against the wall of a Deep Roads tunnel with a cry of agony.

Every bone in her body felt like it had been jarred out of place, the centre of her spine screaming in pain.

She tumbled to the ground, landing heavily on her shoulder. A sharp crack reverberated through the air, and she wasn’t sure whether it was part of her, or her crutch splintering. Everything hurt so much that she couldn’t tell.

Rose gasped for air, but each choking breath was pure pain; it felt as if her lungs had been crushed flat. She wheezed, barely able to move from her side, just about keeping track of the others as they fought off the darkspawn that had ambushed them from a side tunnel. How in Andraste’s name had they managed to cram an ogre into so small a space?

“Elf’s down!” barked Oghren.

“I can’t get to her!” that was Alistair, who Rose could hardly see behind a trio of hurlocks that he was fending off with his shield. “Rose! Hold on!”

She attempted to offer a reassurance that she was doing all right, but it came out as a breathless cough. Okay, maybe she wasn’t fine. She wasn’t even sure if she could move her right arm. Something felt wrong around the shoulder. Rose tilted her head just slightly to the side and was treated with the sickening sight of the joint popped right out of its socket.

All right. That was bad.

A low, gurgling growl reached her ears from nearby. Rose turned her head again. The ogre had spotted her again, and even as she watched, it began trundling towards her.

That… was worse.

Weakly, Rosemary attempted to prop herself up on her good arm, even as every slight motion caused her slim frame to protest. She couldn’t let the pain stop her, couldn’t let the complaining in her wrist or the burning fire beginning to spread from her dislocated shoulder prevent her from… from moving.

Each thumping footstep brought the ogre closer, looming, leering. It knew, in its animal, malicious cunning, that she was helpless.

It _grinned_ as it reached down towards her with a huge hand, casting her into darkness. She was barely onto her knee, there was no way that she could-

“BLESSED ARE THE PEACEKEEPERS, CHAMPIONS OF THE JUST!”

Two arrows took the ogre straight in the middle of its face. It jerked backward, giving a howl.

“BLESSED ARE THE RIGHTEOUS, THE LIGHTS IN THE SHADOW!”

A third arrow plunged into the ogre’s open maw, and its roar was cut off into a choked gurgle. Three more followed, until the creature’s head resembled little more than a pincushion, shafts sticking out every which way.

A figure stepped over Rose protectively, bowstring pulled taut. Leliana.

“I will not let you harm her!” she declared. “You’ll have to come through me!”

Leliana’s hands were a blur as she nocked shaft after shaft to her bow, so dizzyingly fast that Rosemary wasn’t certain if it was pure speed or the fact that she’d smacked her head on a stone wall.

Darkspawn screeches echoed through the tunnel as Leliana cut a swathe through their ranks. Oghren and Alistair were able to link up, get back to back, and after a brutal, bloody few minutes, the monsters were left in tatters.

Only then did Leliana turn to Rose, weapon clattering heedlessly to the floor, fear and anxiety writ large across her features.

“Are you all right? Tell me that you’re all right!”

Rose raised a hand – the only hand that she could, and managed a weak croak.

“Maker, let me look at you…” Leliana attempted and failed to withhold a gasp as she rolled Rosemary over, evincing a groan of pain.

“Tough little thing, ain’t she?” Oghren marvelled, walking over. “Gotta have steel bones to take a hit like that from an ogre and still be awake.”

“Can you sit up?” Leliana asked, ignoring him.

Rosemary gritted her teeth and took hold of Leliana’s shoulder, trying to pull herself up into a seated position. With the immediate danger passing, the abuse her body had taken became all the more potently clear. She’d be lucky if the dislocated shoulder was the least of it.

At length, she managed to sit. Maker’s breath this hurt.

She finally spared a glance to her side, searching out her crutch and… oh, flames.

Not only was it splintered into three pieces, one of the jagged chunks had gouged a bloody tear in her side, right through the armour. It was testament to how much the _rest_ of her hurt that she hadn’t noticed until she looked.

“We’re days from the surface,” said Alistair. “Are you going to be able to manage?”

By way of answer, Rose formed a bubble of magic in her good hand and nodded. A little time to rest, perhaps a draught of lyrium, and she’d be able to fix up the worst of it, although healing herself was something she’d always found harder than helping others. You had to concentrate through the feeling of your own flesh knitting itself together, and Rose found it unnerving.

Oghren gestured to the broken pieces of the crutch. “What about that? Spose we could get a spear or something for her to use.”

“I’ll manage without,” Rosemary told him hoarsely.

The dwarf’s eyebrows rose, then furrowed. “If you say so.”

“She’s really pretty good at getting around,” Alistair chimed in.

The concern hadn’t left Leliana’s face. “You’re certain you’re okay?”

“Been better,” Rose managed a shaky laugh. One working arm and only one leg, what a sight she had to make.

“You scared me. I thought – never mind. Please don’t frighten me like that again.”

“Don’t worry, I get hit by another ogre and my body is going to mutiny for the abuse it’s being put through.”

“Let’s get you up,” said Alistair. “Find a better spot to camp than the middle of a tunnel.”

“Aw, I was thinking that the dead darkspawn made it all so wonderfully scenic.”

Leliana looped Rosemary’s good arm around her shoulder, and Alistair carefully bent down, supporting Rose by the waist. By degrees, they lifted her onto her foot. Rose groaned again, hissing through gritted teeth. Her leg didn’t want to cooperate, and her damaged arm was hanging limply. Maker, this wasn’t going to be a fun walk.

Leaning heavily on Leliana, Rose hopped her way through the tunnel.

 

* * *

 

Three weeks out of Orzammar, and Rosemary still hadn’t got tired of being able to feel the breeze on her skin. The Deep Roads had rapidly plunged to the depths of the list of places she’d enjoy spending time in, and having to negotiate more than half of the trip without her crutch had made the whole experience an entirely miserable one.

Warming herself in the sunlight, Rose took a moment to lean against a tree. She always hated going without the prop. Everything became so much harder when she didn’t have it to lean on, catch, keep and maintain her balance. She had to slow down, think a lot more carefully about exactly where she was moving to. If it wasn’t for the recent breakthrough she’d made with Morrigan in shapeshifting, she would have gone utterly crazy by now. As it was, moving about as a wolf had been enough novelty to distract her, though she was taking care not to spend too much time as an animal. Risky, according to the witch.

Still, for all that the Deep Roads had been thoroughly awful, they’d emerged on the far side of things relatively unscathed. Rosemary’s injuries at the hands of the ogre were the worst that anyone was hurt throughout the trip, and considering the hordes of darkspawn, the golems, and the crazed Paragon – Oghren’s wife, no less… Well, it all could have gone much, much worse.

“I have something for you.”

Rosemary looked over her shoulder, saw Leliana approaching, and found a broad smile on her face. “Oh? Is it something nice?”

“I hope so. Here.”

From behind her back, Leliana presented a long crutch. Carved from dark wood, polished to a fine sheen, it had a series of intricate golden inlays from top to bottom, weaving from side to side, in places forming script that it took Rose a moment to realise was elven. It was tipped by a gleaming sheath of metal, dwarven steel, if her eyes didn’t mistake her.

It was all but a work of art, and Leliana was… giving it to her? How long had she had this? When did she get it made? _Where_ had it been made?

“Leliana I… this is beautiful. Where did it come from?”

“After Bhelen was crowned, I went to a smith and traded a couple of favours. He was very happy to accommodate one of the people who put his preferred candidate on the throne.”

Rosemary swallowed. Tears were welling up into her eyes. Foolish as it sounded, she’d rarely ever been given gifts. It wasn’t really something that had happened in the Circle, saving maybe Cullen getting her old crutch repaired. This though, this wasn’t a simple repair job. Dwarven craftsmanship, elven script. This couldn’t have only cost Leliana a favour.

Leliana handed it to her and Rosemary took it, steadying her hand, tucking it underneath the pit of her arm. The height was perfect, and it was sturdy enough to handle her putting her weight onto it without being so heavy that it impeded her. She gave a testing hop. Just right.

“Thank you so much. This is amazing,” Rose hopped forward again and wrapped her arms around Leliana’s neck in a fierce hug.

The bard smiled, and was there a hint of a flush around her cheeks? – she returned the embrace almost instantly. “I’m glad you like it. Alistair and I spent quite a while figuring out what size it needed to be. Quite difficult to take measurements without giving the game away, no?”

 “You are wonderful. I’m sorry for making you put up with me complaining about not having one for these past few weeks. You must have thought about keeping it to yourself, teach me a lesson.”

Leliana laughed. “Tempting, but no. You were having such a hard time, and it wasn’t like you were the only one who ever complained.”

Rose buried her face into the crook of her friend’s neck. “I just… I don’t know what to say.”

“Then don’t speak.”

Rosemary frowned, but any questions were cut off as Leliana leaned in and pressed her lips against hers.

Rose went rigid, and then a tremor went through her entire body. It was…

Well, she couldn’t put words to it. She’d never been kissed before. Leliana was just firm enough to feel assured without being demanding, her mouth was warm, and…

Rose tightened her arms around Leliana and pushed in closer, another shiver.

After what could have been days, they finally broke apart. Leliana’s face was flush, and Rose could feel the heat suffusing her own expression. Even her ears felt like they were aflame.

“I uh, um, well…”

“Was that wrong of me?” Leliana asked, biting her lip.

“No. Andraste’s holy tits, no.”

“You have a dirty mouth, and I would very much like to kiss it again.”

Leliana did so. Rosemary melted into her arms.

 

* * *

 

The joys, really, were in the fine details.

The barely perceptible raise of Sten’s brow as he saw Rose and Leliana combine two tents into one.

The exuberant whoop from Alistair from across the camp, hastily hushed by Leliana – but the man unable to keep himself from grinning ear to ear.

The sly smirk from Zevran… and the suggestive waggle of the eyebrows that followed.

The roll of the eyes from Morrigan, even as she concealed a smile behind her hand.

Oghren’s bark of ‘good for you!’ and subsequent declaration that he was going to celebrate with a drink.

The very slight smile that broke across Wynne’s features.

“No doubt the small elf now wants to do unspeakably disgusting fleshy things to the sister. _Ugh_.”

And Garahel tilting his head to the side, and then greeting Leliana with an enthusiastic bark and a lick.

 

* * *

 

“So, this is it. Country to save, Archdemon to kill, Blight to end.”

They stood opposite one another at the gates of Denerim, besieged by the darkspawn horde, an army all around them, countless men and women brought together by treaties and common cause to fight for the sake of Fereldan.

Rosemary was a little lopsided, having to lean on her crutch while not actually holding it; her hands were occupied with Leliana’s.

“This is it,” Leliana agreed at a quiet murmur.

“It’s going to make for quite the story when we’re done. Think the bards will tell it?”

“Every one of them worth their salt.”

“Leli, I… I can’t even say how glad I am I met you. I wish I’d-“

“Ssh,” Leliana raised their hands together, putting a finger to Rosemary’s lips. “This is no time for regrets. This is not the end.”

Rosemary hesitated, then gave a quick nod.

“You are very precious to me. Be careful. Be safe.”

“Aw. You stole what I was going to say. Wait, I have it.”

Rosemary kissed her.

For one breathless moment, all thoughts of darkspawn and archdemons were gone.

They could do this. They _would_ do this. Together.


End file.
